Definitive Caribbean Blog

Sara Macefield's Impressions of World Travel Market 2011

2011-12-12T15:52:00.004Z

Times may be tough but, as always, the Caribbean Village shrugged off the industry’s woes with its irrepressible partying spirit that injected colour and glamour into this year’s World Travel Market. However, there was no disguising the signs of the global economic squeeze – and resentment among some exhibitors at the high cost of exhibiting at ExCeL. St Lucia had opted for a smaller stand than previously while, for the first time I can remember, Sandals didn’t take a stand at all, preferring to base itself with various tourist boards.

But, despite this, the village not only retained its optimism in the face of the increasing APD burden, but came out fighting with news of continuing investment and new developments determined to keep the Caribbean at the forefront of travellers’ minds. Work has already started to expand Antigua’s VC Bird International Airport, one of the region’s main hubs, while St Kitts is forging ahead with some major tourism and residential developments.

It was encouraging to see new badly-needed life being injected into Tobago’s hotel scene with the former Tobago Hilton becoming the Magdalena Grand and government initiatives to encourage further hotel developments on the island. But, to my mind, it was left to Sandals – one of the region’s most innovative companies – to come up with the most exciting news; that work will finally start next April on the Caribbean’s first over-water villas. This is a development bound to prompt much interest and promotion which should hopefully help to draw attention to the region as a whole.

Having visited the Caribbean on cruise ships this year, stopping in the Bahamas, Grand Cayman and Jamaica and, more recently, staying on Barbados and going off-the-beaten track in the Dominican Republic, the beauty and culture of the Caribbean continually leaves me entranced. And it’s this that makes me optimistic for the future.

The Caribbean has much that rival destinations can only dream of and with new developments and extra products coming on-stream, it has plenty to shout about. As a Caribbean specialist writer, there are plenty of stories I am hoping to tell through Definitive Caribbean. With its unparalleled breadth and depth of knowledge, the relaunch of this website promises to strengthen Definitive Caribbean’s position as an informed and independent authority – and most importantly, one that users can trust.

Emily Ashwell's Impressions of World Travel Market 2011

2011-12-12T15:34:00.005Z

This year the Caribbean Village at World Travel Market again brought a taste of tropical fun to the expo. But behind the glamour of the carnival queens and rum punch cocktail hours, there was serious business to be done.

There are massive tourism opportunities in the Caribbean at the moment. At WTM I was able to get updates on developments, such as Cristophe Harbour and Kittitian Hill on St Kitts and Canouan Island in the Grenadines, to name a few. As well as new tourism developments some well-established favourites, such as Blue Waters and Carlisle Bay on Antigua, have had facelifts.

However, the Caribbean certainly faces challenges in 2012, particularly in the face of the Treasury’s announcement of the double inflation rate rise in Air Passenger Duty (APD) next April. The Caribbean Tourism Organisation has vowed to continue lobbying against the tax, which unfairly hits the region.

It was particularly interesting to talk to representatives from Trinidad’s hotel sector on how the State of Emergency has affected tourism. The good news is that it looks like the new 21st Century Policing Project is set to make a positive impact on Tobago.

I was delighted to return to travel journalism earlier in the summer after maternity leave. One of my first jobs was editing some of the content on Definitive Caribbean’s website, as well as freelancing for my old employer, Travel Weekly, to contribute to its Caribbean features. The depth and breadth of the knowledge on Definitive Caribbean is, I believe, unparalleled. As the internet opens up a world of user reviews that sometimes present vastly differing opinions, it is essential that travellers have access to a comprehensive and trustworthy resource such as Definitive Caribbean.

Jane Anderson's Impressions of World Travel Market 2011

2011-12-12T15:28:00.005Z

There was a generally upbeat mood in the Caribbean Village despite the harsh realities of the worldwide recession and I felt there was an emphasis on returning to an authentic Caribbean, where the islands play to their strengths and unique cultures.

I liked the fact there were many small, family-owned properties as well as large groups, and it was interesting to see the Turks & Caicos promoting the lesser-developed islands as some of the last of the true exotics in the Caribbean, with Salt Cay and the caves and mangrove swamps of Middle Caicos. I loved the emergence of activities like the proposed cycle/swim/run/swim/run across North Caicos, Parrot Cay, Dellas Cay, Pine Cay, Water Cay and Provo.

Russ and Magdalena from True Blue Bay on Grenada were full of news about how they promote local arts and crafts, while Rebecca Thompson at Maca Bana described how guests get taken into the countryside for art lessons and to the hotel’s small-holding to pick fresh produce to cook with the chef. I think artisanal activities such as these are set to become more valuable to tourism in the Caribbean.

This year has seen me travel to St Barths and Barbados to see what these upscale islands can offer travellers on a budget, while on a visit to Antigua I took my children to sample the Puffin Books-inspired kids programme at St James’s Beach Club. In 2012 I’m looking forward to returning to the Caribbean, potentially to the Turks & Caicos for Definitive Caribbean and possibly Bermuda.

In my travels across this region, I will bring back whatever I find to the Definitive Caribbean website, keeping it innovative and up-to-date. I’m keen to seek out relatively unexplored areas like the Caribbean art scene, while at the same time spreading the exciting news of the relaunch of Definitive Caribbean.

Trinidad State of Emergency 2011 – ‘Curfew’ by Stephen Thorpe

2011-11-29T10:25:00.005Z

The situation on the streets of Trinidad has been a cause for concern since the Government announced a curfew and state of emergency in August as a response to growing violence in some eastern sections of the capital Port of Spain.

While the curfew has now been lifted, a UK Channel 4 television programme entitled ‘Unreported World: Trinidad: Guns, Drugs and Secrets’ went out on primetime on November 25th highlighting alarming social problems engendered by gang culture and drugs trans-shipment which is an increasing menace throughout the region.

The twin island Republic of Trinidad and Tobago attracts half a million tourists per annum and visitor arrivals have undoubtedly been affected in recent months. However there is no reason for prospective travellers to abandon plans in the coming weeks as the Trinidad Carnival season gets into full swing before the climax on February 20 and 21.

The main social drag of Ariapita Avenue in Port of Spain with its buzzing bars and restaurants has been unaffected and the mantra for any newcomer to the country remains the same - stay alert, avoid ostentatious displays of wealth and never cross the central Savannah parkland at night. Commonsense is the watchword in fact, just like every other developing country.

Elsewhere, the established beach resort of Mt. Plaisir at Grande Riviere on the north coast and the birdwatching mecca of Asa Wright in the Northern Mountain range remain havens of tranquillity. The state of emergency has been mollified and is expected to be lifted entirely by early December.

For information on what to do and where to stay on island, please see the Definitive Caribbean Guide to Trinidad.

More from World Travel Market, November 2011:

World's Best Tourism Destination 2012

Visit and Invest in Trinidad and Tobago

Our new website is coming in December!

2011-08-04T13:34:00.008+01:00

More Journalists
We’ll have a bunch of new islands for you to digest. The Cayman Islands, written by dive specialist Tim Ecott, and Montserrat, St Martin/Maarten, Saba and St Eustatius written by top food writer, Nigel Tisdall. Jane Anderson is exploring art through the Caribbean, while Peter Ellegard has joined us as our golf correspondent. Sara Macefield has been subbing vast swathes of our top level copy, written about Sailing and Regattas, Culture and Heritage, Food and Drink as well as Cruising in the Caribbean and a host of other new features. Emily Ashwell is looking to become our “News Guru” with Sara - covering all the major hot topics as they arise. Tess Hokin has updated our Anguilla Guide and will be submitting news and reviews about the island as well as stories from St Martin/Maarten.

More Topics with Better Navigation
As our journalists cover more topics, igniting news stories and giving added interest to each destination, so our website will grow – from having fewer than 500 pages to more than 1200! It will also be much easier to navigate around the site…our user testing showed us that our visitors wanted to search by image, by product and by map, so we’re giving them what they want – making our navigation much more intuitive.

Full Directory Listings
We are adding a Directory Listing, so that the site goes from featuring the best of the best in each business category to listing all businesses that cater to tourism on every island. This will be the first directory of its kind, in the Caribbean! However, our journalists will still make their own recommendations of who is doing the best job – it should be interesting to see who gets featured!

Social Media and User Review Integration
Once you’ve seen what we have to say, perhaps you’d like to discuss it or tell your friends? We will be integrating the usual social media tools so that our users can share their research, comment on our reviews and list their favourite places - perhaps recommending a few places that we haven’t managed to get to!

Booking Facilities
And whilst we still don’t count ourselves as a booking engine, rather a guide to the region, we are pleased to say that we are improving our booking facilities so that users can more easily book directly with a product or company, contact a tour operator or down the line make arrangements using a carefully selected booking engine.

We hope you enjoy the new site when it goes live and we welcome any feedback…

Happy Travels!

www.definitivecaribbean.com

TripAdvisor Versus True Advisors by Sara Macefield

2011-02-07T11:40:00.004Z

Whenever I’ve flicked through the hotel reviews on TripAdvisor, I’ve always been puzzled as to how some hotels can attract feedback of such opposing extremes. On the one hand, there will be a glowing report from Mr and Mrs Over-the-Moon about how they’ve had the best stay of their lives; on the other will be a bitter diatribe-like rant from Mr and Mrs Angry that leaves you thinking their lives have been irreversibly blighted by the experience.

How can a single property go from being so wonderful to so terrible?

Having gone on to TripAdvisor and other such sites for guidance, reviews like that leave me more confused than ever and I end up having to go with my gut feeling or better still, turn to a source where the reviews are accredited.

You see, I have a problem with anonymous claims and statements.

As a journalist who is used to putting my name to whatever I write, I have to make damn sure that my facts are correct and my views are genuine and defensible. The shroud of secrecy surrounding the authors of posts on TripAdvsor and other such sites makes me suspicious, especially when I hear of stories where complainants have a grudge to bear or are working to some hidden agenda.

Likewise, I also wonder if syrupy sweet reviews have been posted by the hotelier himself, his friends or even his public relations company.

It doesn’t seem as ridiculous as it sounds as such cases have come to light in the past, and TripAdvisor, for one, promised to step up its monitoring. But is any system foolproof? Allowing people to write whatever they like, without having to face the consequences, sets a dangerous precedent to my mind. Why should they be above putting their name to what they write and why aren’t they made to?

This is the issue that has been taken up Scottish entrepreneur and hotelier Duncan Bannatyne who is leading a campaign again a negative review of one of his hotels on TripAdvisor. His calls for the US-based site to remove fraudulent and defamatory reviews have turned the spotlight on a company, known for attracting the wrath of hundreds of hoteliers for its virtual “anything goes” policy on reviews.

Adam Raphael, editor of the Good Hotel Guide, which tracks its reviews; knows the identity of the authors; and checks up on the comments they make; has branded TripAdvisor as “shameless” for its “feeble” approach over authenticating contributions.

About Definitive Caribbean, Sara says:
As a reader, you may not agree with everything you read on Definitive Caribbean, but at least you know who’s written it, and can contact them if you feel strongly enough.

Such openness brings trustworthiness that those at DefinitiveCaribbean and the Good Hotel Guide strive for and sites such as TripAdvisor can never hope to achieve unless they take radical and badly needed action.

A window into the past with a West Indian twist

2011-01-17T11:42:00.004Z

If you’ve ever visited one of the English-speaking Caribbean islands, jumped into a car and driven off on the left-hand side of the road, have you ever wondered why?
Maybe you’ve been too busy trying to avoid a darting mongoose or dodging the potholes to give it much thought…But this is just one of the many present-day reminders of the islands’ past that has helped to shape these countries today.

The English may have left traces of their time on these islands, but the Caribbean people have given them an unmistakeable West Indian identity. Take the traditional stone-built churches that could have been plucked from any English village, surrounded by tropical palm trees, and hosting the sort of rousing Sunday church services not often found in the UK.

Beautiful Georgian architecture and imposing plantation houses may have taken their inspiration from English designs, but creeping bougainvillea and hibiscus brighten up the stonework and lend an unmistakeably tropical touch. This continues inside such building where beautiful locally-made furniture, of Jamaican mahogany for instance, adds a special flair.

Of course, while English is the official language of these islands, many locals speak “patois”, their own language combining a mix of English, sometimes French, African and their own unique words, that make it impossible for outsiders to understand. Strike up a conversation with locals, and you’ll probably find they have relatives who live in England. They might even challenge you to an impromptu game of cricket and will enthusiastically discuss the latest form of West Indies and English players.

There are even familiar-sounding places such as Brighton or Worthing in Barbados, Falmouth in Antigua and Portsmouth in Dominica, but all have their own distinctive West Indian ambience. In the British Virgin Islands, which are among a handful of spots that are still British Overseas Territories, there’s even a traditional red phone box in one of the bays, which has been ingeniously converted into a shower!

In some ways, aspects of the English Caribbean lifestyle are reminiscent of Britain 20 or 30 years ago, particularly among the older generation who place more importance on formal manners and modest dress. Children are turned out immaculately in their uniforms for school and families turn out en masse in their Sunday best for their weekly visit to church. For visitors from modern-day Britain, it is a refreshing reminder of times past – yet with its own distinct flavour that tells you exactly where you are.

Families at Cotton Bay Village in St Lucia

2011-01-05T10:14:00.005Z

Jane Anderson met with their Director of Marketing, Michael Bryant, at World Travel Market 2010...here’s what she found out...

Cotton Bay Village likes to promote itself as ‘life in full colour’. Take your family here for a week and you’ll certainly feel the rosy hue of a luxury hotel that really understands what families need for a successful holiday.

For starters, this small property in the north of St Lucia has a great range of two, three and four-bedroom villas with designer kitchens, en suite bedrooms throughout with flat screen TV’s, private pools and gardens, all perfect for families or even two families holidaying together, which works out very economically. Villas come in an eclectic range of styles from colonial to South Beach and can be booked self-catering, á la carte or half-board. There’s great attention to detail as re-visiting families find a photograph of themselves in a frame in the entrance hall.

But it’s not just about accommodation. Cotton Bay Village has taken the trouble to devise father and son programmes such as playing cricket with the locals, deep-sea fishing or diving, whilst mothers and daughters can head to Heaven spa for some quality girl time. All programmes are tailormade to family requirements.

For active families there are two good stables next door to the hotel and it’s possible to ride along the sand and take the horses into the sea. Quite a magical experience - especially for children! Families with older kids might like to try kite surfing on the beach. Three-hour tuition sessions cost US$300 to get you started. There’s also an 18-hole championship golf course right behind the hotel. Whale and dolphin watching or zip line adventures can also be arranged.

The Hummingbird Kids Club offers mums and dads a little freedom. The Hummingbird Crèche takes babies as young as six months, up to the age of three years. Staffed by Montessori trained nannies, parents can rest assured their little ones are in good hands. The crèche is free of charge for up to two hours daily. Parents are also entitled to one free night’s babysitting during their stay. If they want extra one-on-one assistance, a nanny can be hired for US$20/hour.

The Hummingbird Club caters for children from four to eight years and is open daily for a varied activities programme with kite flying outings and picnics a speciality. Joanna, one of the Hummingbird carers takes youngsters on beach-combing expeditions where kids return laden with beautiful shells and driftwood to transform into collages and the like. There’s also a cinema room with beanbags for times when kids need a rest out of the sun, along with computers, a Wii and a ‘dirty room’ for painting.

A great innovation is ‘Bring the Baby not the Baggage’ which allows parents to pre-order practically anything they need for their baby such as Johnson’s baby products, cots, highchairs, Pampers nappies and waterwings. Mums no longer need sacrifice that extra pair of shoes for baby’s paraphernalia and this also helps massively with current luggage restrictions imposed by airlines.

Carseats and babyseats are all ready and waiting when the hotel car picks families up from Hewanorra Airport and DVD players with videos of your choice entertain little ones on the one and a half hour drive north.

When it comes to fussy eaters, the Beach Club 1461 caters for most tastes. Think oversized armchairs on the sand and lots of kiddie favourites on menu such as fresh pasta and gourmet fish fingers. Children Under-12 eat free from the 1461 children’s menu every day and under fives are not charged an all-inclusive supplement when a family elects to go all-inclusive.

Bruschetta is a lovely deli open daily, which sells fresh produce from bread and fruits to coffee and wine. Sandwiches and pastries are made fresh on the premises and can be home delivered. There’s also a local supermarket close by, but if you don’t feel like lifting a finger, you can pre-order with concierge.

Butler service is offered, but you can have as much or as little done for you as you like from unpacking your luggage to private dining – a real treat for parents. Life in Technicolor I’d say!

For more general information about the hotel please see Definitive Caribbean’s Review of Cotton Bay Village.

World Travel Market 2010 - DefinitiveCaribbean reports from Excel

2010-12-08T12:39:00.001Z

World Travel Market is the biggest event of the year for us...A great chance to meet and greet our friends from the Caribbean as they update us on all the latest news and views from the region.

This year we linked up with Caribbean specialist journalists, Jane Anderson, Tim Ecott, Sara Macefield and Stephen Thorpe to explore their specialist areas - Cricket, Diving, Family Travel, Weddings and Honeymoons.

Feel free to leave comments and spread the love!

Security in the Caribbean - Danger in Paradise?

2010-11-29T14:49:00.004Z

Sara Macefield explores the subject of security in the Caribbean.

Once again, a Caribbean island has hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons - crime. It is a curse that blights every country across the world, but when it strikes in such a seemingly tropical paradise, the impact is far worse.

This time it was the turn of St Kitts and the victims were a coach-load of cruise passengers who were ambushed and robbed at gunpoint in an audacious attack. Luckily no one was injured, but the blatant nature of this crime meant cruise lines were quick to respond in dropping the island from their itineraries.

And who can blame them? How could they possibly guarantee the safety of their guests ashore with such criminals at large? The victims were left mourning the loss of their possessions and St Kitts was left mourning the damage to its reputation and disappearance of vital tourism business.

As islands such as Jamaica and Antigua know to their cost, the spiralling effect of such incidents can have a deadly impact on their image. Nothing hurts healthy tourism trade as fast as a crime-ridden reputation, and countries have to ensure that they act fast – and are seen to act fast – to clamp down on criminal or anti-social activities. After all, this doesn’t only benefit tourists, but the local population too.

St Kitts has responded swiftly, rounding up suspects and implementing security measures, but this isn’t always the case. Some Caribbean destinations kid themselves, claiming that crime levels are no worse than in London or other big cities around the world - but that’s completely missing the point. Is it really realistic to compare a tropical island, where the population is generally in thousands, with major cities where the population runs into millions?

Of course, holidaymakers need to be aware and they need to be streetwise. However, they don’t expect to have to adopt the sort of siege mentality needed in some rougher areas of the world’s leading metropolises. On the other hand, it’s also important to keep things in perspective. An outburst of violent crime in Jamaica’s capital Kingston doesn’t mean that its popular north coast resorts are no-go areas. Not only are they on a different side of the island, but there’s a mountain range between them too.

Everyone realises that crime happens and when it happens to tourists there will be a flood of international newspaper headlines. It’s then up to the islands to nip the problem in the bud. Catch the perpetrators and put systems in place to prevent a repeat. Paying lip service to such efforts and failing to take appropriate action fools no one.

Editor’s note:
Definitive Caribbean passionately believes in the beauty and friendliness of the Caribbean islands. Crimes that touch tourists are very rare but as in every other country of the world, they exist. As Sara Macefield says, "It all depends on how swiftly governments respond to negate the problems as to whether you should travel to the destination." Our message to those contemplating a holiday on St Kitts is to keep things in perspective - when did it last happen (never) - is this likely to happen again? Unlikely...

For an update to this story please read Cruise Lines Return To St. Kitts After Armed Robbery by Nevis 1.

For information about what to see and do on St Kitts please see The Definitive Caribbean Guide to St Kitts.

Jamaica – the world’s first 3D destination film

2010-11-22T14:38:00.004Z

Travel writer, Sara Macefield, discovers a new dimension in Caribbean advertising.

Jamaica has always been one of the most forward-thinking and high-profile destinations when it comes to advertising. In years past, it carved out a niche as one of those destinations to appear regularly on TV screens in the post-Christmas advertising blitz as it competed with other countries across the world for our attention.

Its memorable TV adverts brought a slice of tropical glamour into British homes, brightening up cold, dark winter nights with glorious shots of dazzling white-sand beaches, ultramarine seas and lush forested mountains. And all to the distinctive soundtrack of the island’s legendary son, Bob Marley and his distinctive One Love anthem.

Now Jamaica is leading the way again with what it claims is the world’s first destination video to be filmed entirely in 3D. This time viewers are drawn even closer to Jamaica’s iconic sights - and the effect is stunning. One of Jamaica’s national symbols, the Doctor Bird, flutters just in front of your eyes as it takes viewers on a 24-hour journey across the island’s most iconic sights in just a few minutes. Even rafting along the Martha Brae river suddenly becomes more real as the punting poles seemingly reach out to touch you.

“While viewers will need to use standard red and cyan glasses to fully enjoy the destination film, it has been released in anaglyph 3D, which means it can be watched on any screen or laptop. The film will also be aired in private viewings and some cinemas around the world in polarised 3D, which requires special screens. This was a conscious decision taken by the eXposure4 team and Jamaica Tourist Board to ensure the widest possible audience enjoyment. The film will be accessible across multi-viewing platforms, including home televisions, laptops and computers, and even mobile phones. Viewers will be able to apply online for free, Jamaica-branded 3D glasses, which will be sent in the post to them. The destination video will be available on the internet on www.VisitJamaica.com and viewers can also request copies on a flexi DVD.”

Look closely and you will spy some Jamaican personalities too. Watch the enthusiastic barman in the nightclub scene, which was filmed with locals. It’s none other than the JTB’s UK district sales manager Torrance Lewis, while the chilled our Rasta-man who appears works at the Mystic Mountain tourist attraction. Jamaican tourist officials are excited about their latest creation and rightly so, because as you watch the scenes unfold, it really makes you want to go. Full praise to Jamaica for having the courage to devote time and money to such a project.

Shouldn’t it be something that perhaps the Caribbean as a whole should consider? At a time when the region is suffering from falling UK visitors amid recession and ever-rising Air Passenger Duty, wouldn’t this be an ideal occasion to invest in such a campaign. After all, many destinations would kill for the sort of photogenic landscapes and colourful cultures that make up the fabric of these islands – perhaps the Caribbean as a whole should follow Jamaica’s example and make the most of them.

For more island information please see our Definitive Caribbean Guide to Jamaica.

Air Passenger Duty - Unfair and Biased? Sara Macefield Reports...

2010-11-15T11:23:00.004Z

Could there, at last, be light at the end of the tunnel for the Caribbean in its fight for a fairer playing field where Air Passenger Duty is concerned?

Ever since the spectre of the new tax emerged some years ago, it has been a cause for controversy. And with the second round of increases coming into force earlier this month, the need for reform has taken on a more urgent need.

The main point of contention surrounds the four banding levels that critics say place the West Indies at more of a disadvantage than other destinations further away.
How can it be fair, they ask, that air passengers pay more to fly to the Caribbean than Hawaii?

How indeed? No one can argue with the facts. Hawaii is around 7,200 miles from the UK while, for example, Barbados is 3,000 miles closer. Yet Hawaii is in the less expensive Band B while the Caribbean is in Band C.

The bandings are actually based on the distances to the capital cities of each country – in this case Washington DC and Bridgetown – a formula branded as iniquitous and illogical by Caribbean nations.

In an impressive show of strength and unity, the region mobilised its tourism leaders in an intensive lobbying campaign that took them to the corridors of power at Westminster.

Their strong words and determination brought tea and sympathy aplenty from MPs – but none of the reforms they asked for, even following the change of government. Faced with such an implacable stance, Caribbean leaders knew they could not afford to accept defeat especially as the number of British tourists to the region has already dropped.

Instead, they have changed tack. Amid high-level discussions at last week’s World Travel Market in London, tourism chiefs revealed their latest idea – to replace the current bands with a two-tier system placing European destinations in one band, and the rest of the world in the other.

The Caribbean Tourism Organisation says just £1 extra APD on flights in Europe could enable cuts of up to £50 on long-haul flights, and even increase revenue. Suggesting a system with potential to bring in even more money to Britain’s cash-strapped coffers could prove to be too tempting a prospect for the government to refuse – leading to the breakthrough the West Indians have been looking for.

But for now, having delivered their report to the powers that be, all the Caribbean countries can do is wait and hope. They’re not in the mood for giving up – there’s simply too much at stake.

Hurricane Tomas, a unique insight from Brigitte Maronie at Villa Caribbean Dream

2010-11-11T10:12:00.003Z

Here we publish an email from one of our friends on St Lucia, Brigitte Maronie, owner of Villa Caribbean Dream - 'a fascinating insight illustrating how everyone was caught out by Tomas - and the chaos it caused', Sara Macefield, travel journalist.

For those of you who did not know:

Hurricane "Tomas" hit us very hard on Saturday October 31st. It was very stressful, because we were completely unprepared. On Friday it was said that it would be a tropical storm and it would be heading out to the open Atlantic. But then in no time it suddenly came straight toward us and changed into a hurricane category 1 and later category 2. The eye passed through St Lucia and St Vincent with a wind speed of 150 km/h but the forward speed was only 10 km/h. That is why it took sooooo long (24 hrs.). It was pouring down rain all this time and everywhere was flooded. I was very stressed out and completely exhausted afterwards. We did not have electricity for 4 days and everything in my fridges and freezer was spoilt! Our telephone lines were not working and after 4 days we could use cell phones, but the internet only came back after 6 days.

Last Friday I had to work my German airline CONDOR - not expecting any arrivals. But they still brought 65 passengers who did not know what had happened here!! More stress again for me, because most of the hotels were closed and the roads were not accessible between Vieux-Fort and Castries and also Vieux-Fort to Soufriere. A lot of bridges were broken. So we had to organize little aircrafts for those people in the night and shuttle most of them to the north, where the damage was not so great. Anyway, we tried to handle it the best we could.

The island is devastated - especially the area around Soufriere. We have NO water in most areas up to now. But people are working feverishly to get things back to normal. We get quite a lot of aid from overseas and also have a lot of international volunteers helping with bringing in goods and fresh water as well as helping with the clean up. The roads are in a deplorable state, but also that is tackled speedily and hopefully things are running much more smoothly by next week. The country will be receiving tourists from November 12th again. Hopefully we have a good high season!!! We need it!

Anyway, just for you to know... I am ok, Noelita and Louis as well as To-To and Lu-Lu are also fine. Our house had only little damage (thanks God!!), but the garden looked like a mine field! We are still cleaning up and do repair works. My next guests will be arriving on November 16th. Until then everything hopefully will be alright.

My heart goes out to the relatives of people who lost their lives and to them who lost all their belongings! It was a very frightening experience for me after living here 31 years and I never had seen something like this. Thanks god, we are still alive. All my friends are ok too. It could have been worse.

I now look forward to welcoming new guests for the high season and hope that we do not get any bad weather within the next few weeks again. It would be great to see some of you again soon too!!! (Editor's note - We believe the best way to support Brigitte and her fellow islanders is to book a holiday now! Please see a review of her property - Villa Caribbean Dream!)

P.S. If you would like to look at some videos check on Youtube. There are lots. Here's a link to one by Mr Arnold Henry - The Aftermath of Hurricane Tomas in St Lucia:

Love to you all .... and let's stay in touch!

Very sunny greetings from St.Lucia!

Brigitte

Hurricane Tomas - St Lucia and Haiti Fight On...

2010-11-07T20:19:00.005Z

It’s the time of year when the Caribbean islands breathe a collective sigh of relief as the hurricane season draws to a close. But this year, it has come back to bite them with devastating results.

Tomas emerged with little warning on the cusp of Halloween to rampage through the Caribbean, causing death and destruction just as islanders started to relax. However, what few outsiders will appreciate is that most islands will have been left unscathed as Tomas concentrated its force on those in its path – namely St Lucia and Haiti. Islands on the periphery of the storm course – notably Barbados, Jamaica and Cuba - also felt its affects, but thankfully to a lesser extent.

Even on St Lucia, it was a trail of two halves with the northern part of the island taking less of a battering while the southern section – around Soufriere – took the full force of the hurricane winds and lashing rain, with roads and houses swept away in the ensuing landslides. Tomas has been declared the worst storm in the island’s history, destroying its lucrative banana crop, and putting the country’s main dam, which supplies the population with fresh water, out of action. Properties such as Ladera have temporarily closed and the race is on to mop up and get back to normal in time for the peak Christmas/New Year holiday season.

As for Haiti – how much more can this poverty-stricken nation take? Earthquakes, cholera and now Tomas but, and you have to take comfort from this glimmer of hope, it could have been so much worse. Tomas is the sort of natural disaster that spares no-one in its path and West Indians are resigned to the fact that such devastation is the price they pay for living in one of the most beautiful corners of the world.

Yet few communities are more adept at recovering from such setbacks. The clear-up operation begins instantly, swinging into action and often resulting in the destinations emerging phoenix-like with a new lease of life.

You only have to look at Grenada, Jamaica and Antigua and others which have emerged refreshed and reinvigorated after such tumultuous events. In these circumstances, many in the tourism industry turn adversity to their advantage by taking the opportunity to upgrade and renew. And it’s with this in mind that those worst affected by Tomas can look ahead and realise that no matter how tough things seem, the strength of the Caribbean islands and their people will shine through.

*Anyone wishing to donate to the ongoing relief effort in Haiti should go to www.redcross.org.uk

Breadfruit and Bligh - The Captain's Artocarpus Incise

2010-10-13T13:30:00.003+01:00

Anyone who ever stepped ashore in the Caribbean has seen them and marvelled, hung with their trademark large green globes, not quite football sized usually but certainly heavier, and big enough to satisfy several appetites at one sitting. Widespread and prolific, you’ll spot them in backyards and boulevards and most places in between, and never confuse them with the cannonball tree. They seem such a part of island landscapes as to have been around forever but that’s far from the case. So whither did it come this island staple, the solidly reassuring breadfruit? And therein lies a story, a gloriously improbable one, writ large in the annals of seamen, tall tales and naval history.

In the late 18th Century plantations in Jamaica and St Vincent struggled to feed their slaves at times while elsewhere in the Pacific British botanist Joseph Banks, who was accompanying Captain Cook, had noted breadfruit as a major food source amongst the South Sea islanders. Plans for transhipment were made and on April 4th 1789 HMS Bounty under Captain William Bligh set sail from Tahiti with 1,085 of the precious seedlings bound for St Vincent. Every schoolchild, and some grown ups, know what happened next. Come on, you should, it’s been immortalized in film and word a few times too.

The Mutiny three weeks into the voyage on April 28th was led by Fletcher Christian and resulted in Bligh and nineteen loyalists being set adrift in an open 23foot launch, effectively a rowing boat in the Pacific. A year later, Bligh was back in England a hero having somehow navigated 3,600 miles of Southern Pacific ocean to Timor, an epic journey in any era and now considered as the greatest act of courage and open boat seamanship in history. By 1793 he was back in Tahiti and delivering the inaugural consignment to Kingstown, St Vincent where his diligence is duly recorded on a suitably impressive tree specimen in the Botanical Gardens: “Breadfruit Artocarpus Incise - a sucker from one of the original plants introduced by Captain Bligh in 1793 on HMS Providence” it proudly proclaims.

A year later they were growing around the Caribbean, and nourishing generations of West Indians ever since. It came as quite a surprise a couple of years ago to learn that Jonathan Agnew, BBC Radio’s Cricket Correspondent, an erudite and worldly man and veteran of several full tours of the Caribbean, had neither heard of nor set eyes upon the self same arboreal wonder. Remarkable. After all, the glossy green foliage, rent into long leaved yellow veined fingers, is as distinctive as the fruit itself, especially when glistening in the rain. It’s not to everyone’s taste of course, and an overcooked breadfruit is dry and starchy. Rosemary Parkinson however, the Caribbean’s First Lady of Food and all things thereof, has a few ideas on how to maximise this most singular of fruit—firstly, like all locals, regard it as a vegetable, "It’s dense and heavy and don’t try and carry more than a handful or you’ll do yourself a mischief."

Some people swear that roasting is best, over coals for about an hour, the skin peeled off later and buttermelt poured over the fleshy white interior, avoiding the pithy core (breadfruit cou-cou in Barbados has herbs and spices added to the mash); it’s used in soups, for pickling, in oil downs and is excellent when sliced, baked or fried too (don’t over indulge though, it’s filling, and that from someone who likes to nyam). The blossom can be made into jams, the flour into porridge or dumplings, and all manner of medicinal benefits are attributed from a chewing gum pain reliever made from the sap to bush tea from the leaves to counteract headaches, asthma and high blood pressure. Young buds are also chewed for mouth and throat ailments.

Whatever its benefits, the tree looks here to stay, West Indian to its Pacific roots. If “breadfruit” hadn’t stuck, then “lifefruit” could have worked.

Elizabeth "Ma Pampo" Israel - Dominica's Oldest Woman

2010-09-30T10:45:00.004+01:00

Time waits for no man, but for dear old ladies in distant Dominica defying the ravages of age is all part of the natural process. Elizabeth Israel became the world’s oldest woman on authentic record when celebrating her 125th birthday on Jan 27th 2000 and, while agelessness is often misconstrued, in her case it seemed entirely appropriate. She never did enter the Guinness Book of Records though, the authorities decreeing that the lack of a birth certificate, which disappeared in a hurricane, precluded it despite a clear account in the local baptismal register. I know - I once spent three days sourcing it before spotting the original entry.

“Even the old people here knew her as an old woman”, said Lucien Da Silva, a long time neighbour in the Glanvillia tenantry near Portsmouth, “and I always felt she was a very special lady”. The register at St John and St Lewis Catholic Church also identified Louisia Frager as godmother and the date of birth as January 27th 1875 but many people in the village actually thought her much older. She was probably one of the last direct descendants of a slave, her mother Magdelaine Israel, a tall “redskin” from Antigua speaking Kokoy dialect, was brought to work on the Morne Talin plantation near Colihaut on the west coast. The terrible 1838 hurricane required a switch to the Picard estate near Portsmouth where she lived to more than a hundred herself. Something in the genes then, or are there other reasons?

When I met Ma Pampo, as she was known to one and all, she was blind but her recollection for times past still sharply acute. On the eve of her 125th I asked what had been the secret. “Well”, she chortled, “I ate callalloo, dumpling, meat, lots of fish and crab”. Sitting straight backed, upright in bed, cuddling a toy Dalmatian, she was listening to the radio in her humble two roomed chattel house. “An doan forget de coconut milk an dasheen either!” Finally, she advised “never eat a heavy meal after 6pm, then drink a bush tea. Fertilizers are making people weak”.

Raised with four siblings, she got up early, drank pure water and went to work at Picard aged 25, picking peas for 2/6d per month. A penny for a nine hour day. Rough trails were the only means of communication, no electricity, no telephone, and Roseau could have been another country, but she recalled her only trip to the capital 20 miles to the south. “My wedding day, and we went by the estate boat”. She bore a son Burleigh Codrington who died at 30 though a grandson Charlesworth lives in England. Pampo was known as Minetta George for a while after marrying Ernest, and remembered “walking to work and being turned back if you weren’t over dat bridge when bell rang at 7am.” Graduating to supervisor, she directed ox carts and the grinding mill, and organised lime, vanilla and coconut processing. “I danced the cacao too,” referring to the now rarely practised cocoa polishing with the feet manoeuvre. She avoided alcohol as a girl, and smoked tobacco in a clay pipe instead. Pampo preached simplicity, honesty, good faith and health care, with humour, patience and kindness never far behind.

In 1979, still strong and agile at 104, she took redundancy from Picard, lived alone and was revered throughout the neighbourhood, a classic case of care in the community, her life led at one with the soil, sustained by diligence, diet and an unfettered environment. “She was a sharing, kindly person”, Martha Martin said, “and the only lady who was never called witch by the children”. Suddenly the old radio crackled into life, a gruff voice from Roseau exhorting “we want Pampo down here to talk!” “Me gwan nowhere”, laughed Pampo, “dem haffa come to here”. Tributes poured in later from far and wide, and there was banter around 25 missing telegrams from the Queen.

People like Pampo are not unusual in Dominica. Just round the corner, I was introduced to Ms Rose Peters, a mere stripling at 117, who had sorted cacao with Pampo, still walked down the lane, chatted to everyone and prayed twice a day. A further four of her close associates were also centenarians, (there are currently over twenty others, three times the ratio of western developed countries), testament to the strength of its motto: After God, the Earth. Israel embodied Dominican toil and spirit from another era, sadly passing away in 2003 aged 128 after complications arising from a pedicure.

High in the Blue Mountains, Jamaican Flowers and Gardens

2010-09-20T15:54:00.004+01:00

Flowers and gardens are part of the rich tapestry of everyday life in the Caribbean, startling in their variety, vibrancy and colour for the first time visitor, but an element of the landscape it’s easy to become blasé about. Run of the mill even, and often overlooked. Every major city will usually have somewhere to while away time amongst unusual trees and plant life, a welcome oasis of tranquillity and calm amid the clamour of urban living. In Kingston Jamaica, the 200 acre Hope Gardens which were officially designated by the Queen in 1953 serve the purpose well and there are other long established havens beyond the city at Bath, Castleton and Cranbrook.

It’s probably true to say though that most of the populace will be oblivious to that holy grail of gardens due east, the stunning sanctuary at 5500 feet in the beguiling Blue Mountains and only 2.5 miles as the crow flies from the central ridge line. It’s impossible to know everywhere in the Caribbean of course and Jamaica casts a veil over its secret places better than most, but Cinchona Gardens has a definite other worldly feel, an ethereal ambience of swirling mists and strange new aromas. The stairway to heaven is never easy to locate either, it’s not the sort of spot you come across by happenstance...to savour the spirit of Cinchona you have to be committed to going...and be prepared for the rigours of the ascent and the occasional landslip.

Deep in coffee country, past Pine Grove, Guava Ridge and Mavis Bank and on towards the mystical heights of Clydesdale, a rough road suddenly veers upwards for two miles to the aptly named Top Mountain junction, from where an even steeper incline, riven with crevasse like gullies and channels to hinder weary hikers, leads to Cinchona, which commands an utterly spellbinding location on a remote bluff above the Yallahs and Green river valleys. It’s quite probably the highest botanical garden in the world (if anyone knows of another at a higher elevation let us know)

Its history and development is equally fascinating; European settlers encountered malaria on the first incursions along the coasts of Africa and Asia in the sixteenth century but it wasn’t until the wife of a Spanish nobleman, the Viceroy of Peru, was miraculously cured by a tea prepared from the bark of a cinchon tree, a native of the High Andes, by the Inca descended Quechua Indians that quinine was taken seriously as an extract. In 1868 seeds were brought from Kew Gardens in London and planted in conjunction with Assam tea but the dual project failed due to competition in India and the site slowly changed from a scientific arboretum to English country garden. By 1874 it was more a centre for orchid propagation under Kew’s William Nock and subsequently botanists arrived from all over the world to view night flowering shrubs and other magical visions in his glass palm-houses.

Sadly it fell into disrepair over many years, severely damaged as well by hurricanes, vandalism and general neglect. I was fortunate to discover this place almost thirty years ago when I was brought for an audience with Andreas Oberli, a Swiss botanist who had just been engaged as project manager to restore the gardens to their Victorian grandeur. Lloyd Stamp, keeper of the estate, has been here even longer and both are dedicated to the cause though Andreas lives in Kingston now. The uninhabited central Great House contained a large fireplace with a ton of dried wood, my first indication that it could get cold in the Caribbean and, though I came for an hour, I finished up staying three days such was the power of the experience.

That spirit still exists today, much of it down to these two latter day guardians. In the early 1980s Oberli dissuaded then Prime Minister Edward Seaga from developing it as his helicopter accessed private mountain club, and even observed another PNP politician Ronald Thwaites ordering his henchmen to dig up rare plants and bulbs to cart off to his own garden. Through all this, Cinchona has somehow survived, not intact, but forever changing; the 150 feet high Masson pines remain, a landmark even in the murkiest of light from as far away as Lime Tree Farm (a stupendous site in its own right several miles away, a working coffee farm and one of the best places to stay in the mountains) the Panorama walk too with its wonderful vistas of the Blue Mountain ridge and main peaks.

There are well tended lawns and flower beds and a lattice work of paths and walkways, interspersed with extraordinary tree specimens like eucalyptus, juniper, Japanese cedar, Chinese cypress, rubber trees, cork oak, incredible gold washed ferns and banks of hydrangea and azalea. At every turn, something new draws your eye. Nowhere is the term splendid isolation more fitting—for a new perspective on Kingston far below, here is somewhere to head for.

Hurricane Allen and other pleasant Caribbean Hurricanes!

2010-09-09T11:53:00.004+01:00

We’re half way through the hurricane season and so far so good, for the most part anyway. Despite projections of a greater incidence than usual in this era of changing global weather and climate, the anticipated flurry of storms has not transpired despite the battering of the northern Leewards and Virgin Gorda last week by Hurricane Earl. Antigua and St Maarten had trees flattened and power outages, parts of the Virgins suffered substantial damage and restaurants and other buildings on Frigate Bay in St Kitts were lashed by heavy rain and high winds. It could have been worse, so let’s hope the status quo continues.

The period is one of fear and loathing for many in the Caribbean, the several thousands who live in less sturdy accommodation, though satellite tracking systems now give ample early warning and time for safety measures which the old time West Indian simply did not have. Seeing out a powerful hurricane then was a matter of experience, good fortune and trusting in the shelter as much as anything else. As an ingénue in Barbados in 1979, I awoke one morning to find everywhere covered in a thick red dust, blown over from the erupting Soufriere volcano in St Vincent. It was a startling revelation, something quite out of the ordinary, disturbing to the status quo. Not long afterwards something far more traumatic and personal assailed Little England, the first indication and realisation that perhaps all was not sweetness and fine light in these balmy isles.

Sundays then were reserved for beach cricket, and that alone, and Bathsheba on the east coast the chosen destination once a month. This one morning, someone rang advising against it, mentioning a brewing storm which the dogs accepted but not the mad Englishmen relishing the noonday sun. Beautiful day, over Farley Hill we drove, past Morgan Lewis mill and down to that glorious foreshore on the most atmospheric part of the island. Things were blissful till around mid-afternoon when suddenly the wind whipped up and the sea got angry. Even then, as someone used to rough weather in the Pennines, often for months on end, I wasn’t unduly concerned. The game continued, though one or two of the more enlightened decided to head back to Bridgetown and the south coast.

A hardy Irishman Mr David O’Flynn lingered with me, but eventually we too were forced to repair to the Edgewater Inn for sustenance. Soon after, we were about to set off for the west coast when the proprietor hailed us, obviously worried: “no one can leave now, you’ll die” were his words of admonishment, spoken in all seriousness and registering like no other. “It’s a hurricane now, and heading our way fast”. We were forced to bed down for the night along with a score of others on mattresses scattered on the floor. It was humourous at first, until we heard a St Lucia radio broadcast echoing through the bar area “Ok Barbados, signing off here, the Caribbean is with you, the Lord God too, we trust there’ll be minimal damage”. By now it was dusk, doors and windows were barricaded and taped, the wind howling like a banshee, the rain driving horizontally.

The Edgewater was built of solid coral stone blocks on a cliff edge high above the roaring ocean, seemingly exposed to the raw elements but in defiance of all the weather could muster and probably one of the safest structures on the island. As darkness fell I took one last glimpse of the world beyond through a chink in one of the thick porthole glass windows. The vision that appeared shocked me to the core - Hurricane Allen was upon us, in all its fury. As far as the eye could see out to the horizon, gigantic lines of white topped breakers tumbled shoreward, immense battalions of them, twice the size of houses. To the right down the coast road, coconut trees were bent at ninety degrees, snapping amidships when the force became too great and scattering their cargo like bouncing bombs, chattel houses had their corrugated roofs peeled back like sardine tins, then torn asunder and flung to the heavens.

A sleepless night ensued, followed by a long, surreal journey back to the west coast later the next day, clearing roads of debris, matchwood trees and people’s belongings. I was dropped off at my place on Gibbs Beach, incredulous at the scene that awaited - a palm tree had toppled right across the car, a write off, the gently sloping beach had all but disappeared, replaced by a 20 feet high cliff, and my cottage awash with smashed cutlery, broken trees and foliage forced through open louvres stupidly left open. My cat clung on terrified at the top of what remained of some flimsy curtains. Twas a salutary sight, an awakening to the awesome power of nature. It was deemed a glancing blow, not even the full impact. In Dominica, people still talk of “David”, in Jamaica of “Gilbert”, reverentially in a way, out of respect. Hurricanes. Don’t underestimate them and ignore them at your peril. Heed any warnings and batten the hatches.

Farewell to Lord Glenconner by Stephen Thorpe

2010-09-01T14:15:00.003+01:00

The Caribbean lost one of its great characters last week. Not a sportsman, statesman, comedian nor entertainer, but someone who defied formal categorisation and remained rather indefinable - an eccentric indubitably, and a true Brit born not just of the silver spoon but with the whole tea set intact. Yes, Colin Tennant, aka Lord Glenconner was one on his own for sure, the last of a breed in the West Indies who bestrode Mustique, south west St Lucia and a few other places besides for nigh on half a century. In 1959 he acquired that Grenadine backwater, a scrub covered, mosquito ridden Mustique for a song, then spent years and half a fortune developing its infrastructure having given Princess Margaret a few prime acres for her wedding present.

After Royalty, the new aristocracy followed - rock stars, media moguls and socialites, in search of escape and hedonism alike which Colin was more than happy to facilitate over the next twenty years. After various management and financial wrangles he decamped to another gilded piece of paradise between the Pitons in St Lucia, importing Bupa, a pet elephant, for company. More trouble ensued over land development and Colin eventually settled for a relatively quiet life running his small estate centred on the Bang bar and latterly selling off plots of subdivided land. I first became familiar with him in Barbados in the 1970’s through his son Charlie who enjoyed bejewelled teenage years in Mustique before sadly dying young; family calamity became a theme but Colin somehow maintained a stiff upper lip throughout.

His trademark outfit of white cotton pants, white cotton shirt and hat never seemingly changed, and I can truthfully aver that I never saw him in anything else throughout our acquaintance. Sometimes he’d misplace the hat and get cross. He was a patriarch, with a loyal staff and following in rural St Lucia and prone to the occasional tantrum when things went awry. Once, in some down at heel shop in Soufriere, he overheard me mention I had to go to Castries the next day and kindly offered a lift (this in the days before a properly surfaced west coast road existed); he collected me in the morning in a battered jeep and we set off on a journey scheduled to take two hours. It lasted eight. At every wayside halt, for every fruit seller, fisherman or higgler in Anse La Raye or Canaries he had a friendly word, or they for him. Chats turned into discussions, long ones; at one stage, just as I thought we were getting somewhere, he drove into a deep drainage gully, almost writing off the vehicle. Four Rastas hauled us out, and we repaired to a rum shop to thank them. The Laird of Lucia I called him, which he quite liked.

Another time I found myself in some smart hostelry, which was unusual in itself, when suddenly Princess Margaret walked in unannounced, clutching her customary bottle of Famous Grouse (half empty as I recall), followed close behind by Colin and his wife Lady Anne, the Princess’s Lady in Waiting. We were introduced, and chatted briefly. A while later I felt a light touch on my forearm. It was Colin, whispering over my shoulder: “Stephen, Her Royal Highness has requested you accompany us to supper”. Lawd God Almighty, I was dumbstruck for a moment. What could a poor boy do? I’d never had the Royal Command before (then or since), me dear ol’ monarchist Mum back in Rochdale would have been proud. As a vehemently (dis)loyal subject of the Crown, I suppose I had no choice, and dutifully accepted. Besides, I was bloody hungry. Later in a memorable evening Colin lifted an eyebrow disdainfully when I failed to rise as Marj briefly excused herself from the table for a fag. As I told him later - I wasn’t going anywhere, so why bother getting up. He despaired.

Only last Christmas, he learnt that a London psychotherapist Joshua Bowler was his illegitimate son from more than fifty years ago by Henrietta Moraes and, true to form, gladly accepted him into the family fold. I bumped into Colin a year ago in late afternoon on an isolated beach at unfashionable Laborie on St Lucia’s south coast. He was taking his evening stroll miles from home, alone in his thoughts at 83, a ghostly figure in the gloaming, in the twilight of a life well spent. We shared a pot of tea. He seemed tired, something in his pale blue eyes said this would be the last time I’d see him. And it was. Many will miss him.

Pelican Bar Jamaica and other scenes to try

2010-08-25T09:44:00.006+01:00

Bars. Love em or hate em, you’ll sure as eggs find yourself in one if you visit the Caribbean for even the shortest layover. You may not know you’re in one, it may look like a shop, a grocery store or a post office, and sell all manner of unwanted items until you spy those tell-tale bottles of dark stuff tucked away on a dusty shelf. Rum to you and I, often it’s clear, or “white” but don’t let that wholesome innocence fool you. Oh no, always treat the white one with the utmost respect in fact, otherwise you’ll wake up later, wondering why. Yes, the rum shop is ubiquitous, multi-facetted, more plentiful than churches some would opine, and there are lots of those to admire.

A bar on a beach people like the sound of too. Sort of double your money, two for the price of one. I once lived close to Mullins beach bar in St Peter, Barbados, the only 24 hour bar in its earliest incarnation and accessible from the south in the days before traffic, not that I was a regular, though it was nice to know it was there, a neighbourly comfort as it were. Bang on a great roadside beach a well, it’s changed over the years, things do, more restaurant than bar for a spell, but the essence of a great place to relax remains. Location is all.

The Owl Bar commands another timeless spot and is aptly named, in one of Grenada’s finest, the Flamboyant hotel, overlooking the southern end of Grande Anse beach and prides itself on convivial late night opening. I knew a chap once who moored a boat bar offshore at Mullins in a failed venture to add the maritime perspective to Bim’s bar scene, but perhaps only in Jamaica, to repeat a well worn phrase, would they ever consider going one step beyond. Let alone actually doing it.

Riding the swell down Jamaica south west, no surfboard just outboard, I was reminded not long back of that other Jamaican maxim “the Jamaica you find depends on the company you keep”. Someone had mentioned “a bar with a difference”, so I thought why not, seen a few already, what’s one more? Far offshore from Black River did seem a bit extreme, I mused, scanning a foam flecked horizon for signs of life, then suddenly a bizarre spindly edifice of driftwood, flotsam and bamboo loomed afore. More a rustic vision of a seaborne “wicker man”, it’s an extraordinary piece of construction, nailed and pieced together on stilts atop a narrow rock shoal in a matter of weeks--- the result of the fertile, some would say damaged, imagination of Floyd a local fisherman.

The Pelican Bar he’s called it, owing to its most regular customer so far out at sea. Colleagues advised him against, exhorting that “him lost him mind” but Sally Henzell at Jakes hotel actively encouraged him. Yep, this place was definitely different. No sign of a barman for a start, least of all a beer on a scorching morning, as we clambered up some rickety ladder. “Jussa small hinconvenience sah, no problem”, whispered the boatman. Jeees...uz.....hey, he’s right though, this is Jamaica, chill out capital, miles from land, blazing sun, no drinks, something will turn up. Incredibly they did, quite a while later.

It was hard to leave, not least because you couldn’t, the sort of place where you never know you may be gurgling your last, should a rogue wave come rolling in. Someone suggested we should stay overnight, and not entirely in jest. I glanced inland at a storm billowing in over the Santa Cruz Mountains and nay..........terra firma’s best.

Hiking in the Caribbean - Take a Local Guide!

2010-08-16T16:29:00.003+01:00

AAAaaah..... wonderful. Stretched out on a comfy lounger, gentle waves lapping by your toes, cocktail bar not too far distant. Dreamy days, languid nights, palm trees whispering in the breeze--everyone’s idea of Caribbean bliss, the stereotype plugged in a traveller’s memory bank. And why not, it’s an image which has sold the region to countless millions of prospective visitors. But wait, look over at them thar hills, that hazy mountain range, what mysteries and delights therein to discover? Thankfully, over the last decade or so Tourism Authorities have come to realise this too and hiking has become a far more high profile diversion, an actively encouraged pastime that adds so much to the participant’s appreciation of a country, the land, its people and wildlife. Get that gear on then, stretch the sinews......... and feel the difference. Most of the islands lend themselves to hiking in some degree, even Barbados and Antigua, the flatter ones, have great coastal walking but it’s the mountainous interiors of the Windwards and Jamaica which are really rewarding, that set the heart and mind a pumping.

The flagship hikes around the Antilles are pretty self evident—if not easily achieved---- the trek to the Boiling Lake via the Valley of Desolation in the fastness of the Morne Trois Pitons National Park in Dominica has a singular allure that the adventurer finds irresistible, if only for the place names, the ascent of Gros Piton in south western St Lucia looks fairly straightforward from distance then is ever more daunting as the true scale of the pyramidal massif becomes evident at its scrub covered base. The twin apex peak of El Tucuche in Trinidad’s Northern Range is quite challenging, Mount St Catherine at 2756 feet in Grenada equally so while St Lucia’s Mount Gimie is no cakewalk either. And then there’s Jamaica, specifically the Blue Mountains. The Danish philosopher Kierkegarde said he’d often walked himself into his best thoughts, which was a nice way of putting it. If hiking nurtures peace and contemplation, even upliftment, there can be no greater theatre than this place, the midnight hike to Blue Mountain peak its apotheosis.

Theoretically you can hike in the Caribbean at any time of year of course, but it’s sensible to temper things on occasion and the rainy season causes all manner of complications. Mountain walking is hazardous if not downright lethal after heavy rainfall and the optimum period is always going to be the relatively dry period between November and April, outside the hurricane season. Daytime temperatures hover around 85 degrees tempered by cooling trade winds but at higher elevations it becomes significantly cooler; no specialist equipment is usually necessary, water being the sole essential requirement with lightweight cotton clothing, rainwear and a solid pair of trainers perfectly adequate for most terrain. Climate is changing around the islands like everywhere else though, and it’s wise to keep a weather eye open at all times. Many years ago I had cause to climb Mount Liamuiga, the volcano in St Kitts, and all seemed set fair as a wispy wreath of cloud encircled the summit on a bright sunny morning.

My guide advised against it however, shaking his head doubtfully, sensing something in the air I hadn’t but, fearing an editor’s wrath, an hour later after much discussion I decided to strike out alone. Ah the folly of youth, a gross error of judgment. I reached the top without too much trouble but commencing the descent the heavens opened without warning, water, water everywhere, in biblical proportions, the steep track quickly becoming a raging torrent, carrying with it mud and tree debris, and nearly myself. It was deafeningly noisy in the thick confines of the forest, disorientating, terrifying briefly till I gained a grip. Six hours later in pitch black I somehow staggered into a canefield miles below, cut to ribbons, safe, but definitely unsound. A rescue team was about to set forth. It was a salutary lesson, never to be forgotten---always, ALWAYS heed local advice.

Caribbean Facts About Sea Turtles - Protect Them!

2010-08-04T10:55:00.004+01:00

Everyone should do it. Wander down a dark beach at midnight or later that is, preferably in the pitch black and definitely without flashlight or camera. A sliver of moonlight on a silvery sea can help but this is no romantic interlude, not for the voyeur at any rate. It is though a heartrending experience with something of the primeval about it, and not to be forgotten in a hurry, to be a privileged witness to the egg laying ritual of the giant leatherback turtle, the largest living marine reptile and known to have existed for 100 million years. Children in particular are wide eyed in amazement, most adults too in truth. It really is that extraordinary to see these great ocean wanderers, leviathans of the deep as big as coffee tables, hauling themselves from the surf on some remote shoreline at dead of night. The males are entirely pelagic with the females only coming ashore to lay eggs after six years of age.

Grande Riviere in North Trinidad is the second most important nesting ground in the world after the beaches of French Guyana, and it’s easy to see why in the period from March to August when 300 have been known to lumber up the beach on a single evening close to the Mt. Plaisir Estate Hotel which is a prime observation post. Dozens of people are bussed in nightly from Port Of Spain three hours away now, it’s that much of a spectacle. It’s strenuous work over 1.5 hours for the poor beast, with a three feet deep hole excavated with its hind flippers initially, then 60-80 eggs deposited in a trance-like state when the inert beast can actually be stroked without distraction. It actually appears to be weeping when a viscous film develops over the eyes but it’s merely a protective measure against sand which is flung around violently in the covering over process, or the removal of excess salt.

The eggs, and the turtles themselves, are highly vulnerable of course - they’re persecuted by egg stealers like the “Cobo” vultures, packs of wild dogs, and not least, dumb humans who also slaughter turtles for meat despite widespread educational and awareness programmes. Green turtles and the Hawksbill suffer the same fate. Things have changed in recent years but it’s still a problem on the more inaccessible north coast beaches like Madamas further west and in other countries like Dominica and Grenadines outposts.

Sterling work is undertaken in St.Kitts by the sea Turtle Monitoring Network coordinated by Kimberley Clark who also arranges constant clean up campaigns on sensitive beaches like Cayon and Keys, favoured grounds of all three species. In Carriacou in the southern Grenadines the Kido Ecological Research Station run by Marina Fastigi and Dario Sandrini actually pays fishermen for turtles caught accidentally, or otherwise, in their nets before tagging and release. The Rosti project (Rosalie Sea Turtle Initiative) in eastern Dominica is another laudable effort to preserve these remarkable creatures and the soon to be opened Rosalie Bay Nature Resort, like Mt.Plaisir, has also set up hatchling nurseries to improve baby turtles’ chances of making it back to the sea. For turtles to survive and flourish in the Caribbean spreading the word is the key, so everyone - do your bit quickly before 100 million years of evolution disappears.

Veni Mange, Bars in Trinidad and Carnival

2010-07-26T22:31:00.008+01:00

They reckon they like a good knees up in Brazil. A Carnival there too apparently, lots of dancing, loud music, dressing up in even louder outfits, that sort of thing. Been there, done that you might say.........and then you come to Trinidad......... and realise those samba groovy South Americans are only playing at having fun. Assuredly, no nation on earth likes to party more than the Trinidadian, “Trinis” to one and all.

An old journalist pal, a carouser, wit and night owl of international repute, now sadly departed, was embraced by strangers like a long lost friend when first encountering hospitality Port of Spain style. “I feel at home here”, he mused within the hour, and shortly afterwards I watched in awe as he brought the house down with an impromptu dance routine during an incendiary, full-on soca night where only foolhardy foreigners dared to tread. Oh yes, “Crash” Lander was a true Trinny in truth.

Any well laid plan for a night out with a Trinidadian is only ever a starter for ten though.....or a dozen..... or a score of other options. Just as you think everything’s fixed and you know what you’re doing, where and when, you’re propelled into a tangential scenario... with a totally different time frame. Zany, capricious and prone to flights of fancy, the Trinny reveller is dangerous to know and hard to categorise. The basic rule is then.... plan nothing. Go with the flow, and watch your step.

The city has spectacular mega clubs like Zen and 51 degrees with dress codes, VIP rope offs and all the trappings but the street culture is just as entertaining... and costs far less. For years, the myriad bars of the Western Main Road in St.James were the favoured haunts, culminating in raucous bonhomie at Smokey & Bunty’s bar around 4am, but now the scene has changed and the Avenue is the hipster’s boulevard of choice. Ariapita Avenue to be exact, home to Rosemary and Allyson’s legendary bar and eaterie, Veni Mange, and newcomers on the block like Coco’s, More Vino, Shakers and lots more.

A fortnight back, I was sat minding my own business, supping a Carib in this neck of the woods when I witnessed something you might only glimpse in Harlem or the Bronx, and possibly not even there nowadays---an extraordinary half hour demonstration of pavement gymnastics by a group of young blokes, who were not really showing off, and definitely weren’t drunk, as though engaged in some wildly exuberant private competition. Olympic coaches would have been proud, patrons in adjacent bars put aside their drinks and gazed in admiration, mesmerised. As did I. It was that good. Not even Lander could have pulled off some of those moves.

Dominica Traffic - Caribbean Norm or Witches Curse?

2010-07-20T11:27:00.003+01:00

It’s everywhere you go. Even the Caribbean has more than its share nowadays, though Anguilla is never overburdened and several of the smaller islands beyond the capital cities are usually untrammelled. We’re talking traffic, lots of it. Kingston Jamaica, Port of Spain Trinidad, Bridgetown Barbados, Castries St Lucia are increasingly clogged with cars as journey to work times continue to expand.

Last week I experienced a strange variation on the theme. The narrow one way systems of Dominica’s main town of Roseau are rarely congested, unless one of the giant cruise liners just happens to have docked at the waterfront, but this was not one of those days. I’d pootled into town from Goodwill in the north, clattered over the river bridge into Queen Mary Street and was quietly minding my own business when the light traffic in front inexplicably ground to a halt.

There was no obvious obstruction ahead, no breakdown, no minor collision or stray dog, just some sort of impasse. It happens all the time of course around the islands, drivers passing the time of day with each other, handing parcels over etc., just as you want to get somewhere fast. I could see passengers gazing sideways where people were thronging the porticoed sidewalk in steadily growing numbers so I turned off the engine, sat awhile because there was no option, and strained to see what the fuss was about.

Eventually, with time ticking on, I leaned out and inquired of a sensible looking citizen “whappen down de road, sir?” His response was immediate, and throwaway; “Nuttin’ much sah, a witch jussa block de footpath” ! Whhaaaaaat?? Apparently then, if a pedestrian comes face to face with a witch, black or white, it’s common courtesy to pass to her right so you won’t be affected by any spell. If she doesn’t allow it, a stand-off ensues and a blockade develops. This had just happened, effectively bringing the whole of downtown Roseau to a halt as drivers stopped to await the outcome.

They may still be there, it wouldn’t surprise me; nobody was budging so I somehow manoeuvred a nifty reverse and made my getaway down a sidestreet. You’d think stories like this were apocryphal but here they’re commonplace. In Elma Napier’s wonderful evocation of a 1930’s bohemian colonial life here in “Black and White Sands” published by Papillote press last year, she muses “it has never been easy to analyse, to define the mysterious charm that has lured some people to stay in Dominica forever, and from which others have fled without even taking time to unpack”. Incidents like this at least give us a clue. Yes, Dominica’s different, very different.

The Standpipe - Caribbean Newsletter - July 2010

2010-07-12T15:01:00.004+01:00

Did you know that we publish a quarterly newsletter? We aim to feature each season's happening events and what's new and exciting around the Caribbean. We feature interviews with leading personalities throughout the islands and recipes from our favourite chefs!

Why not have a look at the topics we cover below and click through to read it?

THE STANDPIPE - JULY 2010

In this edition Stephen Thorpe talks to Colin Hunte, GM at Villa Beach Cottages, we have a look at Diving in Dominica, Boat Building in Carriacou and give advice on where to go for that special Caribbean family holiday.

Our recipe this month is Roasted Plantain wrapped Snapper Fillet with Virgin Salsa and Tomato Coulis, a Signature Dish from the AAA Four Diamond-rated Great House at Nisbet Beach Plantation and Spa, Nevis.

Happy Travels!

Dominica Accommodation - Geotourism on the Nature Island

2010-07-05T16:02:00.003+01:00

It strikes every visitor at once on arrival---a place where humanity and its impact come a poor second to the all consuming power of the natural world. The sheer profundity of the vegetation is hard to assimilate at first, such is the overwhelming effect as narrow strips of tarmac road vie for a presence amid the greenery. Pavements are non existent in rural areas and not for nothing is Dominica the self styled “nature island”. Even Columbus and his crew were taken aback one fair Sunday morn in November 1493 when their ship hoved to through a misty dawn on the eastern seaboard. Landfall was impossible on this rugged coastline and the seamen gazed in awe at the prospect before them. Not much has changed in over 500 years. Only rarely does an island stand alone in the magisterial grandeur of its landscape, and Dominica can lay claim to the most arresting mountain panoramas in the eastern Caribbean. The Morne Trois Pitons National Park was rightly accorded World Heritage Site status by Unesco in 1997.

Topography has defined its singular stance in modern day tourism too, with beach life and the regulation holidaymaker a rare commodity indeed. Instead, the hiker, whalewatcher and birder rule the roost with world class diving another major draw. Recently, community based tourism has gained strength in the wake of native New Yorker Anne Baptiste’s laudable ethos from half a century ago when setting up the Papillote Wilderness Retreat. Her seven rooms sit in two hectares of lovingly tended gardens replete with hot springs, waterfalls and a top class creole restaurant where she’s employed generations of villagers from Trafalgar in the Roseau Valley. Perhaps they should call her the Godmother of Geotourism, the buzzword that defines tourism that sustains or enhances the geographical character of a place—its environment, heritage, aesthetics, culture and the wellbeing of its residents.

Fae and Atherton Martin of Exotica Cottages on a ridge 1400 feet above the capital Roseau have developed the theme in latter years, combining health and wellness, local agriculture, flower growing, traditional music and cooking demonstrations in their hugely successful Community Gardens Culinary Tour which embraces the skills of local villagers from Giraudel and Eggleston. Fourth in National Geographic’s Geotourism Awards in 2008, they’re now hoping to enlist Greenpeace in marketing the concept while Dominica is also set to host the inaugural Green Investment Conference in early October. The location for this is the remarkable wild forested mountainside development at Jungle Bay in the far south east near Delices, the brainchild of environmental activist and visionary Sam Raphael. Dominica is in the vanguard of forward thinking, sustainable development in the Caribbean and this major gathering of concerned individuals will hopefully drive the necessary implementation programme.

Carriacou Regatta 2010, 25th July – 2nd August

2010-06-28T13:23:00.002+01:00

No island in the region can cherish its links to the sea more than Carriacou, the southernmost of the Grenadine chain twenty miles north of Grenada. Known as the Land of Reefs by the original Amerindians, it has a strong Scottish and Irish heritage and seafaring is in the blood. The building of traditional timber sloops is undergoing something of a renaissance too and Carriacou’s hugely anticipated Regatta is due to celebrate its 45th anniversary from July 31st over the Emancipation holiday weekend.

It’s developed into a popular event drawing sailors and visitors alike from Grenada, Tobago, Canouan, Union, Martinique, St Vincent and from as far north as Antigua in a raucous festival of seamanship and good natured bonhomie. Inaugurated by Jamaican John Linton Riggs, to help stimulate the boat building trade, his large workboat the Mermaid, constructed by master shipwright Zepherine McLauren, once won seven regattas on the trot. These sturdy workboats remain the focal point today and are raced in four different classes up to 35 feet in length.

Other sporting and cultural events take place on land and fierce competition is the order of the day. There may even be the odd flagon of Jack Iron rum consumed. For more information do call 443 7930 or 7948 or email on ccouregatta@spiceisle.com.

Help Us Update Our Guides to Trinidad and Dominica

2010-06-21T10:00:00.000+01:00

Our roving reporter, Stephen Thorpe, is currently winging his way around Trinidad and Dominica in search of the best places to stay, Dominica activities and details about Trinidad.

We would love you to comment on what you think we should be looking at. Where are the coolest hang outs? Where should we go for Trinidad birding? Who offers the best sailing, scuba and spa services on the islands?

Steve has a knack for finding hidden gems and is very keen on ecotourism in Dominica and responsible travel…do you have any recommendations?

Leave us your thoughts below and we’ll check them out!

Thank you!
The Definitive Caribbean Travel Guide

Cricket - Lovely Cricket in the Caribbean

2010-06-14T09:21:00.004+01:00

Ah, Cricket lovely cricket. West Indies are embroiled in a three Test series against a strong South African side at present and nothing so far suggests they’re about to upset the form book. Time was, and it’s not that long ago, when a home Caribbean Test series was really something to relish, a time for rejoicing with a battery of truly great players on view, the stands packed to overflowing and rocking to the sweet sounds of pan, soca and conch as the Windies coasted to yet another resounding victory.

No more though, O dear, whatever happened to those halcyon days of yore. It’s a long story, and too complicated to relate here, but suffice it to say the men in maroon have been in apparently terminal decline now for well over a decade now. Just when it seems things cannot get any worse.... they do. This just concluded opening Test in Port of Spain was actually switched from Kingston after the social unrest there, a reminder, if any were needed, that matters beyond the boundary are no bed of roses either.

Before this last game, West Indies had won and lost 152 matches in their history so defeat by 163 runs means their win-loss ratio dips below 1 for the first time since 1976. It’s a measure certainly of how far they’ve sunk and, with cricket still seen as the region’s main unifying force, the lack of success is felt far and wide. The greatest of games is still a passion, nay a religion among the older brethren around the islands, and the pain runs deep. This latest reverse comes hard on a 5-0 whitewash in the preceding one day internationals where tiny Dominica at least enhanced its growing reputation on the world stage by successfully hosting its first ever back to back internationals in the recently constructed stadium in Roseau.

There were decent turn-outs too, and Dominica’s profile was raised further when their 26 year old offspinner Shane Shillingford made his Test debut in Port Of Spain. Miracles do sometimes happen so if you fancy watching West Indies turning this series around then venture along to the wonderful Warner Park ground in Basseterre, St Kitts on 18th June then to the “Mecca” of Kensington Oval Barbados from June 26th for the third and final Test. Just don’t bank on any change of fortune.

Barbados and Grenada Win Gold at The Chelsea Flower Show 2010

2010-06-08T09:48:00.006+01:00

Bloomin marvellous! Barbados and Grenada’s twin gold medals at the recently concluded Chelsea Flower Show were testimony to the rich horticultural heritage in both countries and the dedicated individuals who have nurtured its growth. Barbados’ winning exhibit “Sugar Factory Ruins Reclaimed by Nature” which was designed by acclaimed artist Arthur Atkinson, was its 14th gold in the last twenty one years and was achieved amid 600 competitors from every corner of the globe.

For over half a century Iris Bannochie’s Andromeda Gardens was the flagship destination on any east coast island tour but horticulture is now a boom industry in Bim with COW Williams’ Canefield Plantation site in St. Thomas supplying anthuriums, ginger lilies and heliconias on a commercial scale, many of which were on display at Chelsea. Orchid World in St. George has over 20,000 specimens on view too while Hunte’s gardens, a former sugar plantation, and Flower Forest in St. Joseph are also well worth a visit.

Grenada is no less arresting for the flower enthusiast, and driving around you cannot fail to be assailed by the aromatic whiff of spices at every turn, from nutmeg to pimento, which only thrives in Jamaica elsewhere in the Caribbean. If that isn’t enough of a sensory overload then try some of the fruit of the cocoa tree which is rapidly establishing itself on a far wider scale here. From a small cottage industry started just over a decade ago using ancient machinery deep in the country, the Grenada Chocolate Company has suddenly gained a burgeoning international reputation. It’s purely organic for one thing, and fair trade, only problem is the demand often outstrips supply. And why not, it’s smooth, utterly divine, unlike anything you’ve ever tasted, guaranteed....... and usually unobtainable. Americans purchase it by the suitcase (big ones), damn them, and on my last visit there was none to be had at the airport either.

Like the flowers, shrubs and spices, it reflects the wonderful growing conditions of the rich volcanic soil. Oils, organic soap and cosmetics are another valuable by-product and for the green fingered Grenada is truly a place to savour. Caribbean Horizons run dedicated garden tours to places like Sunnyside, Bay Gardens, The Tower, Joydon and Balthazar estate. Take time out there if you can. Oh...... and some advice for the Chocolate Company...... set up a stall at the Flower Show next year lads you could sell us a few bars there for sure. Unless the Yanks got there first.

For advice on other things to do around Barbados and Grenada and where to stay, please see:
The Definitive Caribbean Guide to Barbados and
The Definitive Caribbean Guide to Grenada.

Coke, Golding and ‘Politricks’ in Kingston, Jamaica ain’t all bad!

2010-06-01T15:10:00.008+01:00

Something topical this week – the news from Kingston, Jamaica is alarming but would you have a clue it was happening if you were in the Blue Mountains, Negril or Montego Bay? We read the views of specialist Caribbean writer Stephen Thorpe, who has been writing about the Caribbean in the UK national press, magazines and international publications for over 25 years.

It’s certainly unusual these days for the Caribbean to feature on primetime and international news bulletins—so when it does, we sit up and take notice. The news out of Jamaica recently however has not made for good reading, or watching for that matter, but it’s important we retain some perspective on the matter. The problems besetting the downtown areas of the capital Kingston are multi-facetted, socially complex and rooted in political machination and corruption spanning more than four decades, a long term cancer at the heart of society. Jamaica is arguably the most arresting, visually inspiring and creative country in the entire region with 99% of its population warm and welcoming, and a sporting pedigree globally unparalleled for its size yet since Independence in 1962 it has been seriously under served by its politicians.

Last week’s horrendous scenes emanating from Tivoli Gardens have scarred Jamaica’s international image once again but this time, whisper it, there may be some sort of positive repercussions. It never rains but it pours—the hurricane season starts on June 2 with a forecast, as ever, for more frequent storm passages too. Ah, Tivoli Gardens. Sounds like some Italianate Eden, replete with fountains and blooming bougainvillea. Er...... no, far from it, it’s a sweltering concrete slum and shanty area housing thousands, abutting nearby Trenchtown, Jones Town and Rema where conditions are no less harsh. No need to rake over the grizzly details, but large swathes of west Kingston are controlled as lawless fiefdoms by drug barons and gun runners, the garrison “dons”, one of whom Christopher “Dudus” Coke, was summoned for extradition by the US back in October.

Prime Minister Bruce Golding of the Jamaica Labour Party and constituent member for Tivoli resisted it, but finally relented unleashing a street war when the residents blockaded the area against government forces and police seeking Coke. He has still not been located. If history repeats itself (and let’s hope it doesn’t) standby for more inevitable unrest. In 1992 Coke’s father, Lester, aka Jim Brown, died in a mysterious fire in prison the day before he was due to be extradited. Your correspondent witnessed the funeral: at the head of the cortege was Edward Seaga, one of Golding’s JLP predecessors as Prime Minister. Draw your own conclusions.

In the 1970’s Seaga opposed Michael Manley’s Peoples National Party which was supposedly aligned with Marxism and Castro’s Cuba and not to the liking of the United States. Guns flooded in from the north setting the tone for present day street culture; even now there are downtown walls smeared with old graffiti from that time: “CIAga Land, Keep Out”. Got to hand it to Jamaicans for retaining their sense of humour in parlous times. The common man refers to “politricks” and “politricians”, and not without good cause. As a former long term Kingston resident I trod carefully in those downtown enclaves, meeting remarkable people like Pastor Bobby Wilmot and Lorna Stanley who gave up a successful 30 year career in Washington journalism to return and offer succour and advice to the “sufferahs” of Trenchtown. These and other brave people like them are undeniably the true warriors of social conscience, not those now supposedly leading the country.

So, what does the future hold for the benighted Land Of Jah ? For the first time in years the police have a presence in Tivoli, so that’s a departure of sorts. And what about prospective travellers, the two million visitors per year, the lifeblood of the tourist industry? Kingston and St.Andrew is still under a state of emergency but at Moondance, Rockhouse and Tensing Pen in sultry Negril, the vibe is unaffected; indeed in every coastal resort, from Jake's and the unspoiled rural backwater of St.Elizabeth in the south to Strawberry Hill and the dreamy Blue Mountains life goes on as normal. The word must still be: go, and savour the upliftment.

For information about where to stay and what to do in Jamaica, have a look at The Definitive Caribbean Guide to Jamaica.

Definitive Caribbean says, fly into Montego Bay and from there choose from a number of other worthy places to stay, where the troubles in Kingston will seem a world away: Coyaba Beach Resort, Country Beach Cottages, Half Moon Club, Jackie's on the Reef, Round Hill Hotel & Villas, Moon Dance Cliffs Resort and Spa, The Caves and villas through Linda Smith Villas and Villa Vacation.

Land of the Living - Nevis Animals and Sea Life

2010-05-25T13:40:00.003+01:00

Here is the sixth installment of articles in memory of Jim Johnson (www.WalkNevis.com) who died tragically on Nevis recently. We are re-publishing a series of his articles over the coming weeks. Each one gives a fascinating insight into the man, his love of Nevis and his infinite knowledge of natural life on this beautiful Caribbean island.

While Nevis is quiet and relaxed, with our gentle breezes and calm waters, we are very much alive and could be easily referred to as the Land of the Living! Nevis is packed and full of life, it is just not of a really loud and vocal nature!

Those long sandy beaches and rolling waves have a wide range of coastal and sea life. Ghost crabs hide in the sand and scurry into the waves to lay their eggs. Cockles bury themselves in the tidal zone. Coral reefs harbour thousands of types of fish, shell creatures, sponges, and sea fans as well as crabs, lobsters, octipi and baby turtles.

Overhead, quietly soaring around is a wide variety of coastal birds. Terns don’t fuss as much as gulls and you will rarely hear a squawk for our pelicans. The magnificent Frigatebirds look like small Pterodactyls, but say little.

Inland there are hummingbirds, banana quits, flycatchers and much more, but mostly active at dawn and dusk and even then not too loud. Also fluttering around with the birdlife are brightly coloured butterflies, moths, and beetles, none of which make a sound. They help our beautiful flowers and plants reproduce another wide category of life on Nevis.

Our noisy neighbours? Check out the frogs at night, that is the mating call of the males saying “Honey, I’m available”. Egrets and monkeys can sometimes be heard making guttural noises as the look for food and argue who is in charge. And then there are donkeys, scare a donkey and you will hear about it for at least five minutes (so just don’t scare them)!

Nevis is very much alive, just quietly going about it.

Talking Tiny - The National Flower of Nevis

2010-05-17T14:50:00.004+01:00

Here is the fifth installment of articles in memory of Jim Johnson (www.WalkNevis.com) who died tragically on Nevis recently. We are re-publishing a series of his articles over the coming weeks. Each one gives a fascinating insight into the man, his love of Nevis and his infinite knowledge of natural life on this beautiful Caribbean island.

The hotels and private homes have some really beautiful flowers that are big and showy. The “National Flower” of the Federation is a large spreading tree that towers 30 feet tall! One of our wild flowers has a single bud that is over 12 inches (30 cm) tall. But the bulk of flora and fauna is not quite so big and showy, look closely and see the small!

Look at the wild areas alongside our roads, it is filled with numerous tiny white, yellow, red and even blue flowers! Blue Rain Eyes peep out after an afternoon shower. Pink Paint Brushes hide in the weeds (they often are the weeds) and mix with multicoloured lantanas.

Then there are the flowers that try to look big, but aren’t. Bougainvillea flowers form shrubs and Poinsettias tower like trees at Golden Rock, but those bright colours aren’t the flowers, they are modified leaf-bracts! The flowers are in the center and tiny, less than ¼ of an inch across!

Then there are the native animals. Some giant moths are found, but tiny brilliant butterflies are the most frequently seen. The “large noise” at night is a small tree frog with a backbone just over 1/3 inch (9 mm). The most delicate lizard species is also one of the smallest now, check out the tiny geckos! Our Hummingbirds dart all around and most count them as small, but for hummers they are actually quite big.

Take some time to appreciate the wonders of Nevis, but look closely to see it all!

Natural Spread on Nevis, Birds, Bats and Beetles.

2010-05-10T11:15:00.003+01:00

Here is the fourth installment of articles in memory of Jim Johnson (www.WalkNevis.com) who died tragically on Nevis recently. We are re-publishing a series of his articles over the coming weeks. Each one gives a fascinating insight into the man, his love of Nevis and his infinite knowledge of natural life on this beautiful Caribbean island.

Nevis is home to many strange and fascinating creatures of all shapes and sizes. Flowers and ferns abound, Bats, butterflies and birds fly overhead during the day and at night. How did they get here? Where did they come from? Where are most of the mammals?

What we are referring to is Nevis’ natural spread. This means the thousands of different plant species, hundreds of brightly coloured moths, butterflies, and beetles, all the birds, and even the bats.

First is getting here, they didn’t take a plane and we don’t think they were teleported by aliens from Outer Space (though we reserve this as an option). If you were to go back in time 20,000 years, the islands were bigger and easier to get between. This was during the last Ice Age and the sea levels were at least 300 feet lower. St. Kitts and Nevis were truly one, as were many places now separated. The plants and animals floated, swam, or flew from one place to the next. Thus most of our natural species are similar to South America (this is the direction most currents or winds go).

We didn’t get everything as many plants and animals have symbiotic relationships with each other. If you got one without the other, it couldn’t survive!

As for many of the animals, including the large mammals, when the oceans started to rise, they died off. Not only massive storms, but smaller territories and restricted food supplies (One jaguar requires 20,000 acres, 2 need more than all of Nevis). The larger predators probably ate all their prey, then died off themselves, the bones would have dissolved into our volcanic soil!

Many later evolved into unique species. So go out and enjoy our natural spread!

Searching for Sulphur on Nevis - Yellow Butterflies!

2010-05-04T10:35:00.005+01:00

Here is the third installment of articles in memory of Jim Johnson (www.WalkNevis.com) who died tragically on Nevis recently. We are re-publishing a series of his articles over the coming weeks. Each one gives a fascinating insight into the man, his love of Nevis and his infinite knowledge of natural life on this beautiful Caribbean island.

This doesn’t mean searching for sulphur, that yellow compound used for making gunpowder and skin creams, but rather looking at all those little yellow butterflies that seem so prominent on Nevis. And they are Sulphurs, Sulphur butterflies!

Sulphurs are by far the most common butterfly found on Nevis and probably in the entire Caribbean Region. They are not just one species, but a whole family and, like families, have a wide range of sizes and colours. There are over 20 estimated types of Sulphurs found on Nevis.

Most are yellow with some type of black markings. Orange-barred Sulphers (three types) are generally larger in size and mostly yellow, but have orange spots or stripes. The smaller yellows seem to mainly be Hall’s Sulphur with a black lining around the outside of the wing.

But then there are White Sulphers, Great White Sulphers, and Florida White Sulphurs! These again are often hard to sort out by a “nonspecialist”, and should not be confused with “White Peacocks”. Some Sulphurs are green!

Sulphur caterpillars are green with yellow stripes and feed on a wide range of plants. They like water and adults can actually drink salt water, so are sometimes found out at sea migrating from one island to the other!

So why not go search for some sulphur!?

Counting Creatures, Cretaceans, Avians and Arthropods

2010-04-26T16:20:00.006+01:00

Here is the second installment of articles in memory of Jim Johnson (www.WalkNevis.com) who died tragically on Nevis recently. We are re-publishing a series of his articles over the coming weeks. Each one gives a fascinating insight into the man, his love of Nevis and his infinite knowledge of natural life on this beautiful Caribbean island.

One of the questions that visitors have been asking lately is “How many different creatures are there on Nevis”. To be truthful, nobody really knows a total count or even all the different species and sub-species.

Over thirty Cretaceans (that’s Whales and Dolphins for those non-scientists) are found in the waters around Nevis, but many are only for a month or so in the Fall and then again in the Spring. There are at least four species of sea turtles, three of which nest on our beaches. No one has ever done a complete tabulation of our sea life!

Then there is the avian population (this is birds, not all those people flying planes and relaxing at the airport), which is constantly changing. In surveys done in the 1980’s, only 72 species of birds were found on or around Nevis. With less farming and a wider variety of plants now being found around the hotels, numbers are currently over 149. Many species are now year-round that were previously listed as “accidentals”.

Then we cannot overlook our Arthopods. At least 60 different types of butterflies are seen along the roadsides of Nevis. There are also listed over 389 types of moths, which can be just as lovely! Also brightly coloured beetles, honeybees and those industrious ants!

There are also several types of bats, lizards, frogs and toads. Plus introduced species such as monkeys, mongooses, cats, dogs, goats and donkeys.

Nevis is a good healthy, natural place for just about everything, so why not come and take part!

The Fruits of Nevis - Are They All Native?

2010-04-20T10:29:00.003+01:00

In memory of Jim Johnson (www.WalkNevis.com) who died tragically on Nevis last week we are re-publishing a series of his articles over the coming weeks. Each one gives a fascinating insight into the man, his love of Nevis and his infinite knowledge of natural life on this beautiful Caribbean island.

'The Fruits of Nevis' by Jim Johnson
Many people come to Nevis and often ask about the many fruits that they see! Questions include : Are they native? What are they? Are they really fruit? How do you eat them? The answers vary...

Some are native and some are not, some we are not sure! Mangos (over 50 varieties), papayas (at least 20 types), and oranges are not. They are primarily “Old World” fruits, originating in Asia or Africa or Europe. Sour Sop, Sugar Apples, and Custard Apples are all originally from the Caribbean (so is Passion Fruit which is technically a vegetable)! Guavas and Bananas grow wild and while some varieties are native, most are not.

Most of the fruit can be eaten straight off the tree, but some cannot. Many people are sensitive to the skin of Mangos, so the fruit must be washed before they can handle them. Mangos are also cooked in a variety of ways. Sour Sop (that strange thorny fruit on the roadside) can be eaten plain or made into soups and sorbets. Plantains and green bananas are mainly fried. Sugar and Custard Apples you eat straight from the tree and as fast as possible before some child comes and steals them from you!

It should be noted that regular apples, peaches and pears all require cold weather to bear, so are imported rather than grown locally. The same applies to oranges, tangerines and citrus, the local ones are always green, but grapefruits are originally from Barbados!

So come, relax, and enjoy some local fruits (or the drinks and wines made from them)!

A Helicopter Tour Around Volcanic Montserrat

2010-03-16T12:55:00.005Z

Out of the flying pan into the fire!

When I was offered the chance to go on a nice relaxing helicopter trip around Antigua I was delighted. I didn’t have any fear of flying ... until I learnt I would be flying towards an active volcano that had blown up just a few weeks before!

Being a seasoned flyer I have to confess I don’t pay much attention to flight safety demonstrations. However with the prospect of flying at a volcano I can assure you I was glued to the 15 minute safety DVD at Caribbean Helicopters. They explained that the helicopter we were to travel in was statistically the safest single engine aircraft in the world .... and what better way of tempting fate that flying straight at an active volcano I thought. We were handed our yellow life jackets (I would have preferred asbestos underpants) and headed to the helicopter.

We departed from Caribbean Helicopter’s helipad near Fort James. You can see the take off video above. We started by buzzing the cruise liners moored at Heritage Quay and then flew out to sea over the crystal clear seas which surround Antigua. We were at around 2,000 feet but the water and sky was so clear we could see the reef and even sea turtles below. From February until April you can be lucky enough to see whales.

The flight takes about 15 minutes but you see Montserrat as soon as you leave Antigua. It’s hard to miss an island with a 10,000 foot high column of steam and ash spewing out of it!

The volcano had been dormant for millions of years and then a couple of thousand years ago it woke up…. with a bad case of indigestion. We arrived and swept around the volcano trying not to become its next meal.

As we arrived it was almost too much for my senses to take in. There was the size of the volcano to absorb and the brilliant contrast between its light, brown dusty appearance and the lush green mountains that surround it. It’s ironic that the ash that has caused so much destruction over the years actually gives life to the rest of the island as a super fertiliser. It wasn’t just the sights that assaulted the sense as all the time we had that distinctive sulphur smell fill our nostrils. It was incredible.

On the other side of the island I saw a sight that I had never seen before and will probably never again.

It was the former capital of Plymouth which had been destroyed by an eruption in 1997. We flew low over houses that had been overcome by mud, lava and ash. It was as if mother nature had decided to put a facial mud pack on the whole town!

We spent around 20 minutes touring the island, all the time we were being updated with interesting facts about the island’s history including the options to leave that the British had given the residents after the last major eruption. Half decided to leave and the other half decided to gamble and stay!

We had an amazing trip and as a postscript, a few days after we visited the volcano it erupted again. This time engulfing the former airport! I can only imagine the departure board “Sorry – flight delayed by volcano!”

If you are lucky enough to visit Antigua while Montserrat is still active then this trip has to be on your list of things to do. It is simply stunning. Just remember to pack those flame proof pants!

Charles Duncombe is an Antigua Holidays expert at UK travel company, Holidaysplease. He flew with Caribbean Helicopters.

The Lounge by FBO 2000, Antigua Airport

2010-03-01T13:09:00.007Z

You could begin to feel a bit like James Bond doing this. After arriving at the mysterious Gate 10 somewhere at the rear of Antigua airport, we speed across the runway in the middle of the night, hazard lights flashing. We draw up next to a large private jet.

‘Will you go straight on board, sir?’

‘Er, I’m not sure that’s such a good idea, given that it’s not our jet.’ I ponder where we might end up. Wichita? …El Salvador? …Afghanistan?

Instead we are taken into a white creole building to the side. It is the Lounge by FBO 2000. The company generally offers airport services (clearing private jets in and out, meet and greet for the smarter hotels etc), but as Antigua airport is due for a fair bit more renovation over the next few years, they have also decided to offer a lounge as a more comfortable alternative to the main departure hall.

It was a little empty when we were there, with just one other family, who, curiously lived just a few miles from us (fly 4000 miles to meet the neighbours…), but then you probably wouldn’t want it to be crowded. So we settled in (actually turned in, in the case of my two children, who spread themselves across two benches), ordered a drink and enjoyed the wait.

The Lounge has sitting areas, a snooze room, wireless coverage, internet access and magazines to keep you distracted, finger food, drinks on request and a couple of shower rooms. There is an outside deck surrounded by bananas if you wish to catch the evening warmth on your last day in the islands. There is even what they call a VVIP room if you want additional privacy, with a recliner and your own television.

It is certainly more comfortable than the regular terminal, which although it has improved a bit recently is still mayhem. And the Lounge would be particularly good if you had to transit in Antigua from one of the other islands, and therefore have five or six hours to kill before your trans-Atlantic flight home.

Our flight was delayed a little and so it was the dead of night by the time we were called to the plane. Our passports were returned and we were taken to the small departure area with its x-ray machine. And again, we loaded up into a 4x4 and, hazards on, we sped across the airfield.

Squawk. ‘Permission to cross Runway 7… Granted.’ We scooted off. The acid lights of the main terminal came into view and we drew up beneath the BA flight bound for London.

The Lounge by FBO 2000 costs US$95 per person (13 and up, children under 12 free). The Lounge is currently restricted to passengers flying on British Airways. Contact +1268 562 7056, thelounge@FBO2000.com.

For more information about the island itself, please see The Definitive Caribbean Guide to Antigua.

Jacala, A New Boy on Meads Bay, Anguilla

2010-02-22T10:29:00.004Z

Meads Bay, the fantastic beach near the west end of Anguilla, has a new restaurant, one to add to the list of ‘must visits’ when on the island. Jacala. You’ll find it at the eastern end of the beach (not far from Blanchards and Malliouhana), set in an open-sided dining room giving right onto the sand.

The restaurant may be new (it opened in mid January), but the two men behind it - Jacques Borderon and Alain Laurent - have extreme ‘form’ on Anguilla. You may recognize their names from Malliouhana, where they worked for 25 years. The name of the restaurant comes from their working partnership, too. Jacala is a melding of Jacques and Alain.

They call their cuisine ‘intuitive’, an intellectual mouthful that might seem to have too much French philosophy behind it. But, put simply, they will work with the ingredients – a good slab of local fish or lobster or beef - do the work, rather than smothering them with rich sauces. Intentionally simple then, but also French at base of course, so you know that what you get will be extremely well put together.

Jacala, which is decorated almost entirely white, with just a few splashes of colour in some cushions, is less formal than you will have come to expect of Jacques and Alain to date. Jacques now wears an open-necked collarless shirt and an easy manner, though he still runs a tight ship of course. They have quite a short menu (relatively), which they will test run over the coming months - and a short wine list (mostly French, but with some concessions to the States. It has already been getting a good rap. Their clientele is as much residents as it is visitors (a good sign as people living in Anguilla really are spoilt for choice).

Also new for the season at Blanchards is a prix-fixe menu, a three course meal with three or more choices at each course, for US$45, which has helped a few regulars through the recession. And they have also brought in some less expensive wines for this winter. Otherwise all still going strong on Meads Bay.

Have a look at our Definitive Caribbean Guide to Anguilla for more information about bars, restaurants and, well anything really...

Ten Ten Ten - Netherlands Antilles Has The X-Factor?

2010-02-15T09:45:00.002Z

It might be a score on the X Factor… er no, actually Simon Cowell would surely never give ten. As it turns out 10 October 2010 is a key date in the Dutch Caribbean calendar, as it is the moment when political changes will take place in several of the Netherlands Antilles.

Two of the islands – Curacao and St Maarten - will be following the lead of Aruba and will take ‘Status Aparte’. While they will remain within the Kingdom of the Netherlands they will have more autonomy and become responsible for their own internal affairs. The three remaining islands, Bonaire and the tiny islands of Saba and St Eustatius, or BES as they are currently known, will actually go the other way, and will become more integrated into the Dutch system. Well, that’s if Bonaire actually goes through with it – having agreed to, they were looking for a referendum on the subject recently.

So, what does it all mean? It means that the BES states will become members of the European Union (this is already the case with Martinique and Guadeloupe, so it is not actually that extraordinary, despite their 4000 or so miles from Europe). The Netherlands Antilles Florin will probably cease to exist – St Maarten is undecided, but Saba will be taking the US Dollar as its currency. And last and most importantly, Mt Scenery on Saba, which has historically been the highest point in the Kingdom of the Netherlands, will now actually be the highest point in Holland.

Poor Haiti? The Influence of John James Audubon

2010-02-08T10:36:00.003Z

There’s been plenty in the news at the moment about Haiti - the country seems to have more bad luck than anywhere in the Caribbean. Around 150,000 people are now thought to have died as a result of the earthquake on 7th January this year, and the figure is thought to finish close to double that. So here’s a bit of inconsequential, but interesting information.

Jean-Jacques Fougère Audubon, “the artist of birds”, was born in Les Cayes, Haiti in 1785. He moved to the United States as a young man in 1803 to avoid conscription in the Napoleonic War and made his fame there recording many of North Americas species by drawing them. His name has spawned birding societies throughout the world. He is most famous of course for his collected Birds of America, published between 1827 and 1838, which includes 435 hand-coloured engravings.

Even now after 150 years they hold their own as superb examples of a craftsmen and artist at work. Charles Darwin quotes Audubon three times in Origin of the Species and many of his later works, and a copy of Birds of America in excellent condition sold at Christie’s in March, 2000 for $8,802,500!

Help Us Update Our Guide to Saba?!

2010-02-01T17:07:00.004Z

Last week we asked you for insider tips and favourite places on St Maarten and St Martin. Thanks for the response. We will also be putting together a guide to Saba nearby. Again, we will be visiting, but it’s good to have a steer before arriving.

Here's what we have so far on our Definitive Caribbean Guide to Saba.

Our main areas of interest are bars and nightlife, hiking, places to visit, restaurants, shops and sports. So if you have a favourite activity or place then please let us know. Plus -

Do you know of any good day sails from the island?

Or spectacular gardens to visit?

Hotel or day spas?

Who are the best yoga instructors and complementary health practitioners?

And finally, because scuba diving us such an important feature of the island – which do you think is the best scuba diving operator and why?

Once again, if you have had a particularly pleasing experience in Saba – or an unpleasant one for that matter - then do please email us at Feedback@DefinitiveCaribbean.com and let us know. We look forward to hearing from you.

And thanks for all your emails with suggestions about St Maarten/St Martin….

The editorial team at Definitive Caribbean

Horizon Yacht Charters, Grenada, opens a new base in St Georges’s – in time for the Sailing festival

2010-01-28T11:07:00.004Z

Horizon Yacht Charters, the yacht charter company with bases in several islands around the Caribbean (Grenada, Antigua and the BVI), is opening a second yacht services office in Grenada, at the brand new Camper and Nicholsons Port Louis Marina in the harbour at St George’s.

Horizon has been established in Grenada for 10 years, at True Blue Resort and Marina on the south coast. At their new office they will offer yacht charter as well as a full yacht brokering service, including purchase of new yachts (Horizon are agents for Bavaria Yachts and Fountaine Pajot Catamarans) and sales. In addition they will offer yacht maintenance and management services, including the installation of new
equipment, repairs and a general boat watch service. Yachts can also be hauled for bottom painting and other hull work. Please see our Review of Horizon Yacht Charters in Grenada.

The new office is opening just in time for the annual Grenada Sailing Festival, which is also based in the new Port Louis Marina. Over five days (29 Jan – 02 Feb) there will be a daily race in several classes, usually starting at 10am, an After Race Lime at 4pm in Port Louis Marina, followed by serious partying each evening. For more information about the regatta, see the Grenada Sailing Festival and for information about the island, see the Definitive Caribbean Guide to Grenada.

Help us Update our Guides to St Maarten and St Martin?!

2010-01-25T10:03:00.005Z

Definitive Caribbean will soon be putting together a new guide to St Maarten/St Martin. We will be doing our research in person of course, but it would be great to hear recommendations as well, to see what our users enjoy about the island and – because we haven’t been there for a couple of years - to discover the latest hot spots.

Here is our current Guide To St Martin and St Maarten.

So, we would very much appreciate any comments or advice you can give on the following subjects -

Beaches - which are your favourite strips of sand currently, on both sides of the island? And why?

Scuba – which are the best scuba diving operators?

Sailing – and the best yacht charter companies?

Spas – which are your favourite spas - hotel spas and day spas?

Yoga, Complementary Health – which individual practitioners and companies give the best service?

Weddings - If you were to get married in St Martin, do you know a good wedding organizer?

Finally, if you’re a Caribbean regular, or you live in the islands – are there things you feel that St Maarten/St Martin is particularly good for?

So, if you have had a particularly pleasing – or unpleasant experience – in St Maarten or St Martin, either side, it doesn’t matter which, we will be covering both - then do please leave your suggestions under this posting so we can discuss your thoughts with other readers, or email us on Feedback@DefinitiveCaribbean.com..

We look forward to hearing from you.

The editorial team at Definitive Caribbean.

Two for Tapas – new restaurants in Barbados

2010-01-21T11:18:00.004Z

Two new restaurants, one on the South Coast and the other in the thick of the action on the West Coast of Barbados, have opened recently and become hotspots for the season. They have gone for a ‘light’ formula. While sushi and tapas have been available over the years in Barbados, these two new restaurants have revamped the theme of small eats on the island.

Nishi is right on the corner in Holetown. Set on the site the old Olives, which sadly closed in 2009 after many years of lively service, the new restaurant offers bistro and sushi. Nishi’s owners have completely redecorated, in a new colour scheme of burnt orange and pale grey. The dining room upstairs is now enclosed and has a menu of sushi and sashimi. Downstairs is the bistro, which serves a mix of Caribbean and international dishes. Their very pretty courtyard contains the bar, where it is possible to eat outside as well.

Tapas has opened on the site of the former Aqua restaurant, which has a cracking setting overlooking the boardwalk on the South Coast. Their chosen style, as the name would suggest, is tapas, and among the general tapas there is a good range of seafood, including mussels and eel as well as the regular calamari. Tapas is owned by three Italians, including Franco Parisi, who until recently was chef at the Lone Star.

Other spots around the island where you can get sushi include Café Luna at Little Arches Hotel, Zen at Crane Beach and at Fusion in Accra. For tapas you can try Scarlet on the West Coast.

For more information about where to eat on the island, see our Definitive Guide to Barbados Restaurants.

Sentebale Polo Cup, Apes Hill, Barbados, 31 January 2010

2010-01-18T16:45:00.006Z

On the last Sunday of this month Barbados will host an international polo tournament with a difference. Teams will be competing for the Sentebale Polo Cup, which has been created in order to benefit Sentebale, the charity for disadvantaged African children. The tournament is backed by Prince Harry and Prince Seeiso of Lesotho, who are patrons of the charity and who will be there in person. Prince Harry will be playing for the Sentebale team.

The charity, which was set up by the two princes in memory of their mothers, aims to help orphans and vulnerable children in Lesotho, those whose lives have been affected by poverty and particularly by HIV/Aids. The charity has managed to help over 3000 children so far and they wish to continue the good work. The Sunday 31 polo match is the first of what is hoped will be an annual fundraiser.

The aim of the Sentebale Polo Cup is not only to increase awareness of the plight of these children, but to raise vital funds so Sentebale can increase its help to those most in need and very often forgotten.

The idea is that the tournament will tour the world over the coming years. The inaugural event will be held at the Apes Hill polo ground in St James the middle of the island. Apes Hill itself is a development of villas around the polo field.

Polo itself has become increasingly popular as a spectator sport in Barbados and in the way of the island - there is always a lively, informal crowd - attending a polo match is a fun day out. The day opens at 10.30am, with special activities for children, and the sporting activity will be in the afternoon, starting at 2pm with a plate match sponsored by the Barbados Tourism Authority, after which the main event, the Sentebale cup match, will take place at 3pm.

Admission is Bds$50 (around £15), tel +1246 422 3147. Children under 5 go in for free. For more information, see the Sentebale website. For more information about sports on the island, see the Definitive Caribbean Guide to Barbados.

Temenos Golf Club Has Re-opened

2010-01-11T12:15:00.004Z

Just before Christmas 2009 Temenos Golf Club on Anguilla re-opened. The par 72, 7063 yard course – the only one on Anguilla - was opened by Cap Juluca, the Anguillian resort, on 19 December.

Set in the west of the island, close to most of the resorts, the course, which was designed by Greg Norman and opened in 2006, sits on slightly sloping ground that falls away to the south coast. The shape of the land gives some lovely views from the open spaces of the fairways - five miles across to St Martin, which sits hazily green in the incredibly strong blue of the tropical sky. The sun is hot and strong, glancing off the crests of the swell between the two islands. It’s a spectacular
setting.

And the fairways are relatively open spaces. Or that’s what they say… Wide they may be, but they are not easy on ‘erratic’ players, as no two of them run parallel without scrub in between. Go even slightly off course and you’re in the rough, which is an unholy mix of sea grape, thatch palm, tamarind and neem tree. And loblolly – which is what you’ll be doing if you go in there. And then there are the ‘water features’.

Thirteen of the holes follow or cross water, particularly on the back nine. You have to be deft to pick your way through them... There’s a challenge, anyway.

Fir more information about the hotel, please see our Definitive Caribbean Guide to Cap Juluca.

For more information about the island, please see our Definitive Caribbean Guide to Anguilla.

The Standpipe, January 2010 - The DC Newsletter

2010-01-08T15:51:00.005Z

The Winter 2010 edition of The Standpipe has just been published.

For those of you who don’t know The Standpipe, it is Definitive Caribbean’s quarterly newsletter. If you have an interest in the Caribbean there’s sure to be something in it for you. We cover news and chat about the islands - about new openings and refurbishments, that sort of thing – and then there are also interviews, stories and recipes too.

This early 2010 edition has written and video interviews with Gary Thulander, the GM of Cap Juluca, a story about hiking in St Vincent and a recipe from the Hermitage in Nevis. The Standpipe also has a regular Photo Essay - this quarter we got hold of some cracking images of Trinidad carnival, which is surely one of the liveliest, most fantastic festivals anywhere in the world.

So if you want to catch up on the latest Caribbean information, and have a bit of fun too, then go to The Standpipe. And if you enjoy it you can subscribe easily enough, right there at the top there.

Happy Travels - Definitive Caribbean

By the way, if you’re wondering why our newsletter is called The Standpipe, that’ll be because the standpipe, the source of running water for many West Indians until not that long ago, was also the centre of village gossip… So, for the best news, come meet us at The Standpipe...

Be a Tobagonian for a Week and Win a Holiday For Four

2010-01-04T17:46:00.004Z

Here’s a bit of fun. If you enjoy playing around with video, particularly making comedy, and you dream of the Caribbean, then you could win yourself a week’s holiday on Tobago (UK residents only I am afraid).

To start off 2010 with a laugh, the Tobago Hotel and Tourism Association has launched a competition called ‘Be a Tobagonian for a Week’, in which you have to produce a video explaining your dreams about Tobago and what you would do there - whether you’d like to be scuba diving on the island’s reefs, walking in the rainforest, or just liming (chilling out with a rum punch in hand).

The spec is one minute max and as fun and comic as you can make it. You send it in and they’ll put it live on their YouTube Channel - Tobago Time, where it can be judged. The ever helpful (and clearly eccentric) Duane Kenny of Stonehaven Villas has put together a few examples of what you might say, but he clearly has the advantage of Tobago itself as a backdrop.

British entrants might have to be a bit creative… Perhaps you’ll find yourself in your tropical shirt in the wintry uplands of the Lake District, or making merry with a string band on the seafront in Blackpool in January…

All entries must be submitted by 18 March 2010. The best video (judged on originality, comic value and creativity among other things) wins a stay in Tobago for a week for four people, sponsored by Golden Holidays, including return flights from the UK, accommodation and tours while on island. The winner will be announced on 20 May 2010.

And when they make it on island, the winners will be asked to produce a video diary of their holiday. More fun then…

See the Tobago Time Youtube channel and competition rules on the Tobago Hotel and Tourism Association website.

New Year’s Eve – or is that Old Year’s Night? – on the Wild Side (of Barbados)

2009-12-29T09:40:00.013Z

For many years it has been a tradition among young Bajans, after the West Coast parties on New Year’s Eve - or Old Year’s Night, of course, as they know it in Barbados - to make their escape to the east coast to catch the dawn and sunrise over the Atlantic Ocean.

But what if you were over there already? It’s certainly a possibility. There is a good new place to stay on the Atlantic side. In early December the Atlantis Hotel in Bathsheba re-opened after extensive refurbishment. Backed by the people who created Little Good Harbour outside Speightstown, the Atlantis should certainly make its mark as a stylish getaway in an unexpected part of the island.

And the Atlantis will be holding an Old Year’s Night party. It will be laying on a meal and drinks and a DJ who will play Old School hits. Ok, not so wild – and the guests might not still be awake at dawn - but there will certainly be breakfast and a hair of the dog with a cracking view - with the morning sun glancing off the sea swell.

And if you don’t quite make it for a New Year breakfast, then the Atlantis is well worth a stopover on a tour of Barbados, which every visitor should do during a trip. Perhaps go for the Sunday buffet lunch (for which the Atlantis was known in its previous incarnation) – which has already got the thumbs up from friends on their Facebook page. With the guys from the Fish Pot at the helm it is bound to be worth including in a trip this season.

For more information, see the Atlantis Facebook page or the Definitive Caribbean Review of the Atlantis Hotel, Barbados.

A Merry Caribbean Christmas

2009-12-21T14:23:00.004Z

As we look forward to a break for Christmas (well, except for our partners in the Caribbean, who can expect their workload to increase with the Christmas visitors, of course), we thought we would share our Christmas card with you. And for a bit of sunny Caribbean fun, see below.

Merry Christmas from all of us at Definitive Caribbean.

Here’s a Merry Christmas in the dancehalls of Jamaica – /Great Tidings from Natty Dread!/ - courtesy of Mike Dread TV and Jacob Miller.

The SandBar - Anguilla Beach Bar

2009-12-14T13:08:00.003Z

Opening in time for this season in Anguilla is the Sandbar, a different type of beach bar in an island that pretty much specialises in beach bars. Set on Sandy Ground, one of the island’s liveliest beaches, the Sandbar is not the simple wooden hut that you might normally expect of Anguilla. Instead it is in a former house among the palms and has a rather different feel. It is more of a lounge, with upholstered seats around the bar as well as some attractive wooden chairs and tables on the sand at the front.

And it is different in atmosphere too. Instead of the regular beer or rum and simple food, the SandBar serves cocktails wine and also tapas. So, while you take in the Anguilla sunset you can share:

Chilled, roasted vegetables with white balsamic syrup and a goat cheese dip, pork wontons with a passion fruit hot sauce or a red cooked duck and savoury pancake with mango chutney.

The Sandbar has been created by Denise Carr, formerly the executive chef of Cuisinart. Originally from Alberta in Canada, she has worked in California and Dubai. Then she came to Anguilla and worked at Cuisinart for three years. She opened up the SandBar in late 2009. With its extremely wealthy clientele, many of whom know the sophistication of St Barths, there was certainly room for a spot where they could kick off the docksiders but still enjoy top wine and food.

That said, for all its different atmosphere, the SandBar is by no means formal. This is Anguilla (not St Barths). And of course the activity will be much the same. Many a corsair - or is that carouser - has been wrecked on the sandbars around Anguilla. Long may it continue.

For more information about Sandbar, join their Facebook Fan Page.

For more information about Anguilla, see the Definitive Caribbean Guide to Anguilla

Indigo, a new Tapas bar at Montpelier Plantation

2009-12-07T16:20:00.007Z

Montpelier, the delightful boutique hotel in Nevis, has just opened a new tapas restaurant for the coming season. Indigo is set in the open-air lounge just above the hotel’s pool and will be open on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays from 6pm to 9pm. It is the only place on the island to serve this style of elegant ‘light bight’ at the moment and so it adds a less formal option to the fine dining at Montpelier.

The menu at Indigo includes around 15 appetizer-sized starters and eight desserts, including sesame tempura shrimp, charred onion risotto with basil froth and chipotle pork tostadito, followed by a trio sorbet and/or a chocolate semifreddo. The tapas are designed both to be individual and to be shared and there is a long list of wines available by the glass, which can be chosen to accompany individual dishes of course.

Indigo will give guests of the hotel the opportunity for a lighter dinner and a change of scene, but for other visitors to the island - who should certainly include a visit to one of the plantation hotels on a trip to Nevis - it will also been an ideal reason to come and have a drink and something light to eat at dusk. The hotel is a lovely spot and it looks particularly good in the evenings.

The opening of Indigo has coincided with other changes to Montpelier. Around the pool itself the view has been opened out – the walls at either end have been removed so you can see the surrounding hills – and the murals, the scenes of Nevis surrounding the pool, have been changed. They now have a more contemporary pattern. This is in general keeping with gradual changes at the hotel, which are aimed to give it a more contemporary atmosphere all around. Finally, a spa treatment room has been created in one of the rooms and so massage services are now available to guests.

Jamaican Slang and Caribbean Proverbs

2009-12-03T18:01:00.004Z

The West Indians have always been lyrical and laconic. And they have a lovely turn of phrase, using things that surround them to near poetic effect, even when they are cussing you out. For a bit of fun we have collected some well known West Indian expressions, proverbs and sayings. Some even make into calypsos. One which did is –

"The higher the monkey climb, the more he expose..." (or ‘the more ‘e show ‘e tail’ in Barbados)

The more you show off, the more your faults are visible to those around you, or the more successful you become, the more you are under scrutiny. But, in Jamaica -

"Monkey know which tree to climb."

The ambitious person knows where to apply their energy. And while on the subject of animals -

"Evah pig got a Saturday."

Everyone will pay for his deeds at some point. And -

"Horse dead and cow fat..." In a long story it is used in the sense of ‘and so on and so forth’.

And then you add

"...and donkey maugre."

For islanders there is particular significance in -

"De sea ain't got nuh back door."

The sea is not a safe place so you need to take precautions. And the Jamaicans again -

"Dem go together like batty and bench."

Two peas in a pod. It seems that crows get bad press in the Caribbean. The Trinidadians will have it that if -

"Corbeau pee on yuh"

Nothing will go right, you have a hex working on you. The Jamaicans call crows ‘John Crows’ and delight in referring to moonshine rum, distilled but completely un-aged and un-mellow, as -

"John Crow Batty"

"Well, Cheese on Bread!"

(Barbadian amazement!)

Saba - The Highest Point of a European Kingdom

2009-11-30T12:15:00.003Z

Here’s an odd fact you probably didn’t know about the Caribbean. That the highest point in Holland is on a tiny Caribbean island called Saba. Admittedly ‘Netherlands’ means ‘low-lying lands’, so you wouldn’t expect much, but Saba really is tiny. It’s just three and a bit kilometres by five.

But it rises incredibly steeply from the sea, to a vertiginous (well, comparatively vertiginous) 2885 feet, in the indomitable Mount Scenery...Saba, which is an autonomous territory of the Netherlands, is an extinct volcano, the most northerly of the inner chain of Eastern Caribbean islands. It is also a fantastically pretty island - but who would ever have thought it could be the highest point of a European Kingdom?

Death by Octopus - A Lobster's Fate

2009-11-23T15:10:00.010Z

You’d think that being a lobster would make you pretty much invincible on the reefs of the Caribbean. This is possibly except where humans are concerned, who can simply pick you up and drop you in a pot of boiling water. But generally lobsters would be invulnerable, you’d think. They’re pretty heavily armoured. Their carapace is hard and covered with nasty spines. And some species have those fearsome-looking claws - you don’t want to get the wrong side of them whatever your size.

But then you probably haven’t reckoned with an octopus. These animals are fearsome, and spooky, worthy of a science fiction movie really. Each of its thousands of suckers has admirable sucking power, so it can grapple you and drag you down and it can change colour faster than any animal alive. It is even a shape shifter, making itself look like a sea snake or a lion fish with ease. Of course octopi have run riot in human imagination, which has pictured them large enough to sink a ship, but actually most are relatively small.

Not that this much consolation to your average lobster. And here’s a macabre thought. Imagine you’re an average lobster on your rounds, picking over the reef, when a massive blanket descends on you from above. It envelopes you. If you were a fish you would be dispatched with a peck that would break your spine. But for the lobster there is a nastier fate in store. All it can do is to wait - like a medieval knight unhorsed, in a suit of armour so immobilising that the first attacker will simply pull the visor aside and thrust a dagger into his eye. In the lobster’s case you must wait for the octopus’s incredibly sharp beak to peck a hole in your head, after which it will inject venom that will turn your brain to mush.

Good Morning - A Lesson in Manners

2009-11-16T16:57:00.003Z

It’s one of those aspects of West Indian life. You are expected to greet people, when you meet them. Even if you don’t know them. It sometimes seems odd, coming from a big city in which people barely even look one another in the eye. But in the islands, people say hello when they pass in the street, often from the opposite sides of the road, despite the fact that they do not know the other person. People even say good-morning when then get on a bus in some islands, to an assembled company of people they don’t know. An exchange cannot pass properly until you have.

I found myself standing in a bakery in Roseau in Dominica, waiting my turn to buy a rock cake and one of the island’s fantastic juices this time, for a belated breakfast. I am surrounded by schoolchildren who are on their break. I am about to make my order when all goes quiet. A ‘big man’ walks in. he is covered with gold. Perhaps he is a hood. They all seem to know him, anyway. He walks straight up to the counter and says:

‘Gimme a pattie. Beef.’ He points.

There is a pause, as the lady behind the counter holds his eye. Two seconds, three, four...

‘Good morning’, she says.

It stops him in his tracks. Suddenly everyone is minutely interested in the signs on the wall, anything but the main counter. He says good morning before he asks her more politely.

Oooh what a put down...

World Travel Market 2009 - A Precursor

2009-11-13T10:07:00.003Z

Whoops. Apologies for the oversight this week. No entry for the Definitive Caribbean blog.

You’ll be glad to know, however, we have been using our time well at World Travel Market, a travel trade fair, which is a travel experience in itself. Literally every country in the world is represented there and has its stand. You can go from South America to the Philippines and then via the Ukraine to Australia without jetlag - well, nearly, as the whole experience is frankly pretty boggling and exhausting to be honest. The building itself seem to work like a psychological vortex, sapping energy in a thoroughly twenty-first century way.

But among all the business, attending has its moments. The Lithuanians had a green dragon this year. I saw him pick some poor unfortunate and follow them until they ran and hid. On the Brazilian stand they were dancing. And in the Caribbean area, well… some time in the afternoon, they did as they always do, have a party.

And of course, to top off the entertainment, there are the baroque activities of the transport system that gets you there (or possibly doesn’t), the Docklands Light Railway. Actually it wasn’t so bad this year.

The purpose – to collect information about what’s new in the Caribbean for the coming season… Look out for our report to come.

Jet Lag - Can it work in your favour?

2009-11-02T12:29:00.005Z

Flights to the Caribbean from Europe leave in the middle of the day. It’s not exactly a normal time to go to sleep, but in my case – as I’ve usually packed late into the night before - I doze off when there’s a moment’s quiet (knowing subconsciously that there’s eight undisturbed hours ahead of me). Generally I’m gone by the time the engines roar on take off. Then there’s a stuttering, low oxygen snooze for several hours. It becomes a sleep of Lethe. The whole of my recent life – the problems, concerns, even the pleasures – is simply elided from memory. The change in perspective, as forward looking as the plane itself, means that I wake up with nothing in mind but the coming Caribbean trip. It’s the way it should be.

And the good is just beginning. With the hour change you touch down at three or four in the afternoon, which in turn means that you clear the airport and arrive at your hotel just in time to see the sunset over the sea horizon. The tree frogs ring in the trees and bushes around you and there is the gentle wash of the waves. After that there’s a drink, and dinner. Understandably you’re exhausted by ten o’clock – it’s two or three in the morning at home – so off you go to bed early.

And then after a full eight hours of sleep you wake at six, in the still of the Caribbean dawn. The early morning is the loveliest time in the islands. It is usually calm and of course it is not too hot. If you take a walk you will see a few people about, perhaps taking a ‘sea bath’ in the calm water or dusting their porch. Life tends to start early in the Caribbean so that the working day is over by the time it becomes too hot. Waking at dawn can last for a few days, if you’re not pushing it at the other end of the day.

It all sounds too good to be true. And of course it is. Payback time comes on the flight home (somehow I never sleep until we begin the descent into land). Then the flight dumps you out on a cold morning, often still in the dark, feeling hideous. It’s a sting in the tail, but gradually the memories take over and soon enough you’re thinking about next year.

A few things you probably never knew about Bananas

2009-10-26T15:02:00.002Z

Bananas plants are not trees. Technically they are actually very large herbs. They grow from a rhizome, on a stem of tightly packed leaves a bit like a cigar. They can grow as tall as five metres or more.

They fruit once, producing a proboscis that droops down, on which grows a ‘bunch’ of bananas.

A bunch of bananas is not the cluster of eight or ten bananas that you buy in a supermarket. These are often called ‘hands’ (well, they do look like so many fingers, I suppose). A bunch is usually about ten hands and can weight 35 kilos.

Bananas themselves grow ‘upside down’. As the proboscis hangs down, so the square black point of the banana, the unattached end, points upwards.

But surely the loveliest fact is the banana’s botanical name. It is called musa sapientum, or ‘the muse of wise men’. You can just imagine an early guru (bananas originate in the East) sitting in the shade of a banana plant, enjoying the fruit and having spontaneous wise thoughts.

Accents Galore - An Amusing Look At Caribbean Language

2009-10-19T13:41:00.003+01:00

It’s one of those quiet pleasures of travelling the Caribbean. To hear, in the speech of West Indians, sounds that you are sure originate elsewhere. Well, they might, anyway. Accents are notoriously difficult to pin down. As soon as you think you have caught one within the lovely lilt of West Indian, it evaporates into other sounds. The harder you try the more they seem to get away from you.

It’s only English accents I am referring to, as they are the ones I know. I believe that old Breton can be heard in the French spoken by the natives of St Barths and no doubt regional traces can be heard in the creoles of the Spanish and Dutch islands too. And there must be affects from all the African languages that newly arrived slaves would have spoken.

They say that Shakespearean English is probably more similar to the English spoken in Harlem than to that of current day England. And on a good day I’m certain you can hear Irish in the speech of Montserratians. In fact it’s not that illogical there, in the Caribbean’s ‘Emerald Isle’. Montserrat was known as a place friendly to English-speaking Catholics in the mid 1600s and the telephone book is full of names such as Ryan, Farrel and Daly. But then the same thing happens in Anguilla. Supposedly as a result of a shipwreck. You can be standing on a beach, rum punch in hand - it helps in this endeavour, I suspect - talking to a man and you’ll find he addresses you in, well… Oirish. It’s almost Caribbean craic.

If it is mostly befuddling – Dominica and St Lucia have obvious French tinges - Trinidad has a slightly comic edge. People swear you can hear Welsh laced into Trini speech. But consider this. It’s a fact that people have trouble with a Welsh accent, and all too often they slip into an Indian/Pakistani accent by mistake. With so many Trinis from the Indian subcontinent, who knows which is which.

It has been said for years that Bajan speech is derived from West Country English. And there is a certain logic to this too. In the mid seventeenth century, when Barbados was being populated by the English, Bristol was the most important port in the West of England (Liverpool had not yet come into its own). And Judge Jeffreys had a part to play too, after the Pitchfork Rebellion in 1685 and his Bloody Assizes, in which many West Countrymen were deported. It seems a long time ago, but, sit on a bus in Bridgetown, and close your eyes and...fleetingly...you might almost be in Bath or Okehampton.

It hit home most for a friend of mine when she was visiting Harrison’s Cave, where she heard the guide say – ‘This here is a stalagtoite. And this, is a stalagmoite….’ She could, she decided, have been in Cheddar Gorge.

Review of Jamaica Farewell by Morris Cargill (1978, Barricade Books, 1995)

2009-10-05T11:44:00.007+01:00

Jamaica Farewell is an exceptionally touching memoir of a man in the process of leaving an island to which he belongs. It was the 1970s, politically a difficult time around the Caribbean, and many of the wealthy islanders were leaving because they saw no future there. For Cargill the situation was even more poignant because he was writing commentaries in the newspaper about the situation and it was getting him in trouble. Eventually he felt he had to go. This is his tribute to an island that he so obviously loves.

His writing is clear and direct, so it is generally easy to read. At the same time it is strongly opinionated – as the man himself obviously was. His columns in the Jamaica Gleaner were testament to that. But given that the pleasure of reading has a good deal to do with enjoyment too, it is important that it is shot through with generous good humour. It starts with – and then is peppered with throughout - the funny stories of happenstance and eccentricity that seem to occur more in Jamaica than anywhere else. Cargill is also a sharp observer, whether it be the curious lilt of Jamaican language or the learning behaviour of bananaquits (he sees them learning to hover like hummingbirds to get at nectar).

Viewed from the perspective of the early 21st Century, Jamaica Farewell can seem paternalistic, even patronising, but it doesn’t take long for the true spirit of the man to come through. Actually Cargill was a rebel and a radical in his day. He scandalised white Jamaican society by adopting a black child and he introduced radical new worker conditions on his plantation. And he was hard-hitting when he wanted to be, relentlessly pursuing causes in which he believed. He was known in the 1970s as one of the scourges of the Manley government for his columns in the Gleaner. At times you can feel the columnist warming to his theme in Jamaica Farewell, whether it be drugs or the remorseless purgatives in Victorian English medicine. Occasionally they jar slightly in the writing – perhaps because he knows he is being contentious – but mostly they are seamless and of course they often lighten the book with obvious good humour.

The key emotions of the memoir however are eternal. It is clear to feel the man’s love for a country which he can see going to hell in a handcart (then a very popular streetside vending platform in Jamaica) – shortages, election fraud and for him personally threats of prosecution for being anti-government in his writings. He has done what he can and so he decides to leave – for an uncertain future in New York.

Most of us are visitors to the Caribbean. While we are stunned by the beauty of the islands – and Jamaica is among the most beautiful - and we are usually impressed by the people, we only see the surface. Jamaica Farewell is very well written and an immensely touching book that will illustrate the attachment of West Indians to their islands.

Often it turns out to be an unavoidable bond. Two years after leaving, Morris Cargill returned, living out the rest of his life there.

Retractabelt Limbo - Arrivals in Nassau

2009-09-28T15:50:00.004+01:00

Airports are mostly pretty faceless, sterile places, despite what Alain de Botton (recently writer in residence at Terminal 5) would have us believe. The terminals are generally pretty ugly and people are usually tired, children fractious and suitcases (mine anyway) always seem to be last out onto the carousel. I find I just want to get through them as quickly as possible.

Which makes it all the more delightful when a moment arises - something surprising, ironic, illogical or comic. One happened to me recently in Nassau in the Bahamas (after the BA flight out of Terminal 5 as it happens). It didn’t start well, but by the end I was spellbound in bemused fascination, not knowing whether to squirm and join in or run for it.

Heading for the Arrivals Hall I passed the string band – traditional instruments, tropical shirts and straw hats – and I noticed a small kerfuffle in the corner of my eye. A woman, from a previous flight by the look of it, was clearly so taken by this reception committee that she simply had to dance. The band were happy enough to play along. And the pirate compere, who was swashbuckling around, engaging new arrivals in the mind-blowing excitement of being in the Bahamas, giving out brochures and advice, was loving it. I guess it brightened up his day no end.

I managed to sidle by into the main Immigration hall, and into the maze of retractabelts that keep you going back and forth, left and right, covering about two hundred yards in a building just twenty yards across. Presumably a bored official sets them up to be as long as possible, despite there being little chance of a sudden influx of a thousand desperate passengers who need to be kept in order. But I had this inkling that trouble was about to follow me.

Things were momentarily uneventful … left twenty yards… right twenty yards… left twenty yards… oh bollocks, I can’t be bothered with this... I just removed the belts from their stands and rehooked them and made my way up to the yellow line that way. I joined the five couples standing there patiently.

Moments later there was a slip sliding behind me and a slightly monotone hum. Along with the others I looked around. And couldn’t help but smile. The dancing woman was doing a limbo under the retractabelt tapes, all six of them, and was gradually making her way up to the yellow line. Her mother (I suspect) tried one, thought better of it, and then went around the long way, back and forth, encouraging her on at each straight.

They joined the Immigration behind me, puffed but still humming the tune. Don’t Stop the Carnival, I think it was… There was an engaging rebelliousness about them, but soon came a moment of panic. Was she about to ask me to dance? Luckily her mum chipped in. They were off to the Atlantis. I knew the one, the huge theme park hotel on Paradise Island - yes, the waterslide passes through the shark lagoon. Yikes, I thought, I wonder if they’ll survive (the sharks, I mean).

Not me. I’ve always thought the best of the Bahamas was the out islands and so I was headed further afield as soon as I got through the Immigration queue. Actually I was off to kayak along the Exumas. But that’s another story...

Caribbean Citrus Fruit - Shaddock, Tangor, Ortanique

2009-09-21T10:08:00.004+01:00

As you’d expect, there are many different types of citrus fruit in the Caribbean. You’ll see them in colourful piles in the markets - limes, lemons, oranges (or ‘greens’ as some of them ought to be known) and grapefruits. And you can have fun picking and crushing their leaves. They release an oily but tangy citrus smell.

But in Jamaica you will find other citrus fruits besides these, and they have their own idiosyncratic names. The shaddock, for instance, which is closely related to the grapefruit. Elsewhere it is known as the pomelo, but here it took this name from the Seventeenth Century English ship’s captain that introduced it to the island. And the tangor, as it is known in the rest of the world, a hybrid of the tangerine and a sweet orange. This name is just so much prosaic nonsense to the Jamiacans. For them it is an ortanique, part orange and part tangerine finished off with the -ique of unique.

And finally there is the delightfully named ugli fruit, which is exactly what its name says it is, a squat fruit with a nobbled and warty skin. It is a hybrid of a grapefruit, the orange and a tangerine. And just to prove the expression - beauty really is only skin deep in this case – its flesh is not ugly at all, but juicy and pleasant.

Caribbean Dominos - A Game of Slap and Slide!

2009-09-14T15:31:00.007+01:00

Dominos is an all-Caribbean game, played from Cayman round to Curaçao, and particularly via Cuba, where even El Jefe, Fidel Castro, was known to be partial to a game.

You will see it in action in bars around the islands, at taxi stands and under trees on afternoons of leisure.

Actually, more accurately, you will hear it being played – West Indian dominoes is played with customary Caribbean demonstrativeness. A ‘card’ as it is called in Barbados, is not laid down on the game table. Most of the time it is slapped down and then slid into place.

It looks so simple...and yet...there is far more strategizing than you would ever imagine, and most importantly there is also an active mind at work. Even players clearly the worse for wear - or is that the worse for beer? - will be counting off the dominoes that have already been used and finessing the ones that remain, judging who might be holding them.

A word of warning, then. Do not ever, ever, take a West Indian on at dominos for money. Regular players just beat you every time.

Interested in the game rules? Have a look at John McLeod's Rules of Domino games: Jamaican and Caribbean Dominoes.

Irony in the Islands - Caribbean Maps Come Alive

2009-09-07T09:35:00.007+01:00

It’s an eccentric view, to be sure, but I have often imagined the Caribbean islands as an animal skeleton. It sits, looking left, perched at Jamaica, its body Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic) and its head and neck, Cuba, stretching out towards Mexico. Balanced by its tail, the many island vertebrae of the Eastern Caribbean, the western end of Cuba might be about to peck Cancun.

I wonder what animal it might be. It could be an iguana perhaps, or a tree-dwelling cat. But then its tail is prehensile - Trinidad is embedded, holding firm onto Venezuela in South America – so perhaps it is a tree porcupine or a pangolin – though it looks too ready to leap. It might even be a chameleon or a dinosaur. The Bahamas, which admittedly stand ceremonious on the fact that they are not actually part of the Caribbean, do look like one of those brightly coloured fan-shaped backplates.

Individual islands have their ironies too. Jamaica looks like a turtle, languishing calmly in the sea, momentarily surfacing to breathe – and it’s an image about as inappropriate as it is possible to be for the frenetic, ever-lively Jamaicans. Guadeloupe is well known as a butterfly (and there are nautical confusions there too), but its compatriot Martinique looks more like a flea in mid-leap. Or is that a skiing glove? And St Kitts and Nevis, in true form, are like bat and ball. All it would take is for St Kitts to pivot around its handle and it would knock Nevis into the mid-Atlantic.

But my favourite image is that of Cuba, which from the perspective of the rest of the Caribbean looks like an alligator hovering over them, threatening. It’s true, Cuba could be scary – as soon as it opens up fully it will threaten to swallow their livelihood by taking all their tourism. With one switch of its tail it could descend on them and gobble them all up. But then step back a bit and you will see the incisor of Florida hanging over Cuba, poised to chomp onto the Yucatan and bite it in half. And suddenly Cuba looks like a wriggling tiddler. And so it has been for the past 50 years. Thing is, looking at the map, Cuba might just manage to get away.

Harum Scarum - Caribbean Flight Frights

2009-09-01T08:43:00.009+01:00

As a group of islands, you’d expect the Caribbean to have some, well... ‘sporting’ landing strips. And so it turns out. There are short runways, runways with cross-winds, runways with cliffs at either end, and runways that inconveniently have a hill in the way, just where you’d want the pilot to line up to land.

We have tested them all and have put together a roll of honour – the Caribbean’s top three scariest landings! And here they are. Enjoy...

1 St Maarten
There’s a rather short approach to this runway, so the beach-goers get a bit of a shock from time to time.

2 St Barths
You worry that as it comes in to land the plane will take the hat of the car drivers on the road below.

3 Culebra, off Puerto Rico
And yes, there’s a hill just where you want the pilot to line up here, so you swing around the hillside.

And before you go, if you would like to read a story about landing on Saba, a bright green pimple of an island whose airstrip is shorter than any self-respecting aircraft carrier, then have a look at Landing on Saba - Not Something for the Sane! which is the fourth video in the above playlist.

Firefly - Light Emiting Diode or Lights Emits Dies

2009-08-24T10:43:00.006+01:00

Of all the weird and wonderful instances of insect behaviour found around the Caribbean – and there are ‘Hercules’ beetles six inches long in Dominica and ancient insects millions of years old caught in amber in the Dominican Republic – one of the loveliest and most distinctive is the firefly. To see one, meandering across your bedroom at night, or flickering in the garden, is one of those moments that give a feeling of real privilege.

Officially the firefly belongs to the family lamprydae, but of course it takes its common name from its characteristic of flashing at night. Which is of course a mating display. Males fly around flashing, in the hope of impressing a female on a nearby leaf. And if she likes the quality of the flash – apparently some are sexier than others - then she will reply with a responsive flash after a specific time period.

Generally Fireflies like dank, forested areas, particularly around streams and in gullies for instance (Fern Gully leading out of Ocho Rios in Jamaica used to have hundreds, but the petrol fumes have done for them now apparently). Equally they can be seen in gardens (near ponds and rivers). I was told once that they have just twenty minutes of ‘flash’, after which, it was said, they die. A high risk strategy, then.

Put two fireflies together and they will often flash in time. There are places in the world (though I have not heard of one in the Caribbean itself) where whole riverbanks of trees flash in time – on for a second, off for a second, on for a second, off. In the Caribbean you will have to be happy to see them individually. And, hopefully for them, in flash-induced pairs.

How to Eat an Orange - Markets in Santo Domingo

2009-08-17T12:07:00.006+01:00

West Indians certainly do sales with aplomb. Market stalls are as carefully presented as art galleries. You might see a range of colour co-ordinated cigarette packets, a pyramid of avocados or a clutch of umbrellas all carefully leaning against one another so as not to fall down.

And if the set is worthy of a stage, then there is certainly drama and the ‘lyric’, with a constant backchat and sales patter, to bamboozle you into buying. Coconut salesmen call and shout then chop coconuts for you with a flourish of their machete and when you buy a snow cone in Jamaica you can expect the third degree – all to get a cup of crushed ice flavoured with some concentrate to give it taste.

But in the Dominican Republic they have what must be the most stylish way of... well, peeling an orange. It is a small metal machine. You fix the orange into a clamp and then start to wind – all with a theatrical flourish of course – and a sharp scoop then begins to cut into the peel, shedding the orange (or often green) skin right down to the bottom layer of pith, leaving a neat serrated pattern of rings. Chop the orange in half and you can scrape the flesh of the orange out with your front teeth. Perfect.

Returning to my favourite orange seller in Santo Domingo not long ago, I found that he had upgraded. Not the same at all, I thought. The old machine, the one he wound with a flourish, had been forsaken and instead there was a battery driven one, with a motor in the spiral shape of a huge inner ear. But hey, he executed it all with the same dexterity and drama. And the orange was as juicy and sweet as ever before.

How to Eat a Mango - Or Survive The Guadarun!

2009-08-10T15:33:00.010+01:00

Plenty of types of fruit can be a bit messy to eat, but none surely tops a mango, for which frankly you need a bib? Or possibly swimming trunks. I met a person who jokingly said that they are best eaten in the bath. Another went as far as to say they were best in the sea. Apparently the salt of the water on your hands improves the flavour, complementing the sweetness of the mango.

In addition to being the messiest fruit, mangoes are surely also the most exotic. They are impossibly sweet when they are ripe, and their satin skin has the most amazing and inviting range of colours. From green (even then they can also be used, in chutneys, for instance) they turn yellow and orange, then a hundred shades of blushing red. Some take on an outrageous, luscious pink. There are scores of varieties. The most popular ones around the Caribbean are the Alphonso, Julie and the Number 11. It’s always worth getting hold of one. In terms of taste they are in a different league from anything you can buy in a supermarket at home.

It must have been the God of contrariness that designed that stone, which is shaped like a cuttlefish skeleton. And those filaments, which stick in your teeth, leaving you clicking for the rest of the day trying to get rid of them. But once you become a devotee you take these things in your stride. Actually, opening a mango, sectioning half the flesh within its skin and turning it inside out like a hedgehog is quite fun, particularly if there are children around.

All of which leads, in a roundabout way, to my personal favourite mango-eating moment. It was in Guadeloupe, at the very end of the Guadarun, a 150km staged running race that takes place on five islands around the archipelago over six days. You run on beaches, brutal burnt rocky terrain and over the not inconsiderable mountains (one stage resulted in a ‘personal worst’ marathon time of eight hours 32 minutes, but then there was 9000 feet of climbing). All in the tropical heat of course.

The final stretch of the race runs along the cliffs of the eastern edge of Grande-Terre (it’s the easterly of the two islands, see an explanation of Guadeloupean geographical oddities). After 30 kilometres running in the sun – it was so hot that even the clouds had evaporated - the course turned down into a cove, coming to a finish on a beach. Here I was handed a vast pink and red mango and a knife. Picture then, an exhausted ultra runner now ecstatic - knowing that the challenge is now defeated - sitting in a rockpool up to his waist, mango juice dripping down his chin. Never has a mango tasted so good. Nor been as messy.

Landing on Saba - Not something for the sane!

2009-08-03T13:15:00.008+01:00

I am sitting on a veranda in St Maarten shooting the breeze, after a formal interview, with an old resident of the island. I mention my upcoming visit to Saba (my first, back in 1989). Saba is one of the other Dutch Windwards. It stands on the sea horizon somewhere just out of sight. Jokingly, I express concern about the landing.

Just to let you know some key facts - at 400 metres the airstrip is extremely short, it sits on the only (nearly) flat bit of land on the island – it’s still on a slope, though - on a promontory with a 150ft drop at one end and a 350 ft drop at the other. You don’t want to mis-time it, anyway. As you’ll see in the clip below there can be cross-winds too. They make you want to lean forward and tap the pilot on the shoulder and say –

‘Excuse me, I just think you ought to know, the runway’s over there.’

Sure, they have special STOL aircraft (Short Take Off and Landing), usually Twin Otters, which anyway are fantastically manoeuvrable, and the pilots have to retrain every ten minutes – and you know they want to crash even less than you do – all that bureaucracy... But still it’s a nervous moment, landing on a strip shorter than most self-respecting aircraft carriers.

Eventually the conversation was concluded by my wizened interviewee, in a voice that was calm, if slightly dead-pan, no lugubrious... or was that apocalyptic?

‘Doan worry, man,’ he intones. ‘They only use half the runway...’

Unfortunately, when I landed, they decided to use the second half of the runway...

When you’re dangling in mid air, seemingly on a piece of string tweaked by a malevolent air sprite, runways seem deceptively small. My mind shuffles quickly – fine, there’s the island, but where the actual landing strip? Hold on, he can’t mean that postage stamp, surely? Oh, he does? Well, you’re coming in far too steep, mate – manoeuvrability maybe, but you’re going to overshoot. At least he is pointing along the runway, so the cross-winds aren’t too bad. But then a blast buffets us from the side and we lurch left. He brings it back on line admirably quickly, but still he is aiming too far down the strip. I am sure of it.

By now he is gliding. We slide high over the cliff at the start of the runway, past the windsock, then 100 yards later past the terminal building with its diminutive fire engine. Eventually we touch down half way along the landing strip. Alarms beep all over the place. The woman next to me in Row One put her face in her hands and her husband goes into rictus, bolt upright with an electrified expression. And then there is something as close to panic as I have seen in a pilot. His faces furrows in concentration. He proceeds with his drills, putting on reverse thrust and the brakes at the same time. The plane roars, strains and judders under the load.

Suddenly a tyre bursts, and we begin to bounce sideways as well, slewing right. Finally we come to a halt. The pilot takes in a deep breath... And lets it out again... Sanguine feller. Later, my joke ran that when you opened the door you closed it again... having decided to get out the other side of the plane because of the 400 foot drop with no steps, but actually it wasn’t quite that bad. We have come to a halt, at forty-five degrees to the runway, with about fifteen yards to spare. That’s maximum runway utilization, but not much room for comfort. We walked to the terminal building wobbly legged. Except the man next to me, who is still stiff and moving like a mummy.

Welcome to Saba. Oh, I nearly forgot. What’s Saba actually like? Well it’s great. Odd but intriguing to visit. Once you’ve got there that is...

If you’re not up for the adventure, you can actually go by boat nowadays. Meanwhile, enjoy the video clip of a landing at Juancho E. Yrausquin Airport.

My Top 6 Plants From The Caribbean, by James Henderson

2009-07-28T10:42:00.012+01:00

Botanical gardens in the Caribbean are always a pleasure to visit. Tropical plants – particularly if you do not know them - are endlessly exotic. They are often incredibly brightly-coloured. Their flowers are weird and wonderful - some look more like sculptures than anything natural. Orchids are extraordinary. And who would ever design a flower like the lobster claw or the torch ginger? They might almost bite you.

There is a botanical garden in nearly every island, and in them nearly every plant has a story. I’d always recommend taking a guide when visiting them and when hiking (while elsewhere I am not necessarily convinced about guides). But here they bring the place alive with all the stories. These can be to do with the origins of the plants, where they came from and how they got to the Caribbean (see our recent newsletter article about Captain Bligh and the Plant Hunters), or how they grow. Also, what the plants are used for – many are used for medicinal purposes as well as for decoration and for food.

As you walk the around the garden a guide will crush leaves to reveal the smell (this is particularly good on citrus trees, but also on others such as clove and camphor) or they will point out oddities – you can guess what the red film of the lipstick palm looks as though it might be used for, but what about the sandbox tree – in fact it takes its name from its pods, which were once used for containing blotting sand (to dry ink on the page).

Here are few of my favourite Caribbean oddities, discovered in various botanical gardens over the years -

Quinine, used in the treatment of malaria, comes from the bark of the cinchona tree, which grows best in cloudforest - at high elevations.

The periwinkle, a pretty pink flower on an unassuming green bush, has been used in the treatment of cancer.

Pimento, a spice that grows particularly well in Jamaica, is also called allspice (because it tastes like so many other spices combined – cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg for instance). The spice comes from the berries and the wood is used to flavor jerk food when cooking. Allspice can even be used to cure and dye leather.

What fruit would a cannonball tree give up? You’ve guessed it, a massive, woody ball. Interestingly this huge tree has very delicate flowers, which open at night and fall to the ground with the light of dawn.

Mahogany tree pods explode, releasing a spray of whirligig seeds (a bit like a sycamore).

In Haiti, one type of hibiscus is known as Choublac (literally ‘shoe-black’). In years past in this extremely poor country it was used to provide an inky black juice that could be used as a replacement shoe polish.

Coconut milk - How to eat a coconut

2009-07-20T09:47:00.005+01:00

We left you all hanging a month ago...as I handed back a coconut to the vendor...with a promise of more to come.

This time, with a mighty chop of his machete, he split the coconut right down the middle, and tore it into two with his hands. And then, with another slightly more delicate cut he sliced off a fan-shaped section of shell. After that he handed all the bits back to me.

This is the fun part of drinking a coconut. You use the small section of shell to scrape off the lining on the inside of the nut. This changes as the coconut ages. It starts off a thin film of jelly on the interior of the shell, but gradually as the liquid in the coconut dries out this hardens into a white flesh, first springy and then eventually into dry coconut – the sort used in confectionery or roasted to make coconut chips.

It was the reason that I had asked for a nut that was not too young. The lining on this nut was a quarter of an inch thick and it was just becoming firm. The fan-shaped slice slid under the layer of flesh perfectly, bringing it up in rinds as slippery and uncontrollable as small white fish. Eventually I managed to stuff them into my mouth.

Delicious.

Lignum Vitae - Wood of Life, Truncheon or Natural Viagra?

2009-07-13T16:07:00.007+01:00

Any tree with the name lignum vitae - translated it means ‘the wood of life’ – is surely worth a nod of respect. But this is one to doff your cap to. Lignum vitae takes the word hardwood to a new level. It is a very hard wood indeed, 4500 on the Janka Scale of Hardness no less, according to Wikipedia (the next closest, Brazilian ebony, comes in at 3692 and teak gets a paltry 2330). Unsurprisingly lignum vitae is also known as ironwood.

A native of tropical America, it grows on most of the large Caribbean islands. It has been adopted by the Jamaicans for their national flower – for what turns out to be a monster of a tree, it has a very delicate purple, five-petalled bloom. But here’s an example of how hard it is. Lignum vitae wood has been used as replacement ball bearings, even as an axle. It is quite resinous and so it lubricates itself, meaning that it works well in a marine environment, for pulleys and in working parts.

In the story of how Richard Lupinacci of The Hermitage came to Nevis in the 1960s, he talks of fighting his way through overgrowth to the old plantation house that turned out to be nearly 300 years old. The builder took a hammer and knocked the frame of the building and said - ‘Ah, lignum vitae, lignum vitae…’ Doubtless if it had been any other type of wood it would have been eaten by termites and fallen down long before.

Lignum vitae is also exceptionally heavy. And so it was used around the Caribbean for ballast in ships. Elsewhere it has been used for cricket bails and for British police truncheons. And there is another disarming quality to it too. The wood of lignum vitae is so heavy that it actually sinks in water (doubtless, like ice, it sinks in jack-iron too, see the article below).

For all of this, the name ‘wood of life’ apparently derives from the tree’s medicinal qualities rather than any physical prowess. The resin has been used for many years, in the treatment of arthritis and other ailments. At one stage it was thought to work both a contraceptive and a treatment for syphilis – and you can imagine, the naughtier calypsonians have had some fun with the idea of the strongest wood around. This stuff is so strong you can brew tea from the wood shavings. By gum, that’s probably harder even than Yorkshire Tea…

A Rum Old Ferry Ride

2009-07-06T14:45:00.003+01:00

Of all the ferries you will encounter in the Caribbean, the most endearing one must be the twice-weekly link between Union Island to Carriacou in the Grenadines. It is a short hop, just a few miles, between two very small islands and so a small boat is appropriate. It is, or was, anyway, a small sailing boat with an engine – though last time I took it I had to help rig the sail. It’s a pleasant enough crossing - people come thousands of miles to sail in these waters for their holidays.

But it’s the unexpected things that happen that make travel in the Caribbean such fun. After I had helped to rig the jib (the sail at the front, anyway), the helmsman shuffled around the floor of the boat and pulled out a white plastic two-litre bottle. He thrust it at me.

‘Here, man, try a bit of the jack.’

I peered through the open neck of the bottle. Swilling around in the bottom was a viscous-looking liquid, slightly coloured, yellowish, but I couldn’t tell if that was the liquid or the suspension of particles that were bobbing around in it. There was organic matter in there too, small strips of greenery, all lined up like the sea grass on a current. I obviously looked doubtful.

‘It jack-iron man, the strongest rum you can get.’

It is true, jack iron is exceptionally strong rum, over 150 per cent proof. This particular (obviously unnamed) brand apparently didn’t come from Carriacou, where no jack iron was being produced at the time (officially anyway). Instead it came from Trinidad, where a big distillery has a small output. And yes, it was incredibly strong. It seemed to burn and then evaporate immediately, like some acid will ‘o the wisp.

But the most extraordinary thing about jack-iron is not its strength, rather the fact that ice sinks in it. I have seen it happen – it was on another occasion, this, there wasn’t much chance of the helmsman finding a coolbox on the floor too. Not that you’d want to drink a whole glass of jack-iron, but our host filled one up and then dropped two ice cubes into it. Instead of bobbing back to the surface and clinking against one another, they carried on to the bottom of the glass and swam around there for a few seconds before becoming still. Weird.

If anyone knows why ice sinks in jack-iron, please let us know why.

Review of The Blue Hour by Lilian Pizzichini (Bloomsbury)

2009-06-30T20:24:00.022+01:00

The prospect of writing even a review of a biography for Jean Rhys is slightly scary. She wrote formidably depressing books, including a particularly lugubrious – if admirably clever - take on the Caribbean, Wide Sargasso Sea (she took the character of the mad creole woman, Rochester’s first wife, in the attic in Jane Eyre and told her story). And Rhys was well known as difficult person in real life. It is compelling material however. There is no doubt that for all her faults, Rhys is one of the leading lights of twentieth century writing in English.

Lilian Pizzichini’s new biography is sharply written and readable. It certainly doesn’t dispel any of Rhys’s reputation as a difficult person, but The Blue Hour is sympathetic in that it tries to understand why Rhys was how she was and it certainly does give an insight for the reader into her behaviour.

The book begins with Rhys’s return to Dominica as an established writer in 1936, using it as a springboard to describe her upbringing on the island and to start a generally chronological narrative. The point for Pizzichini is clear from the beginning, though. The facts of life in Dominica are merely stepping stones to help reveal the developing psychology of her subject. From the beginning she lays the ground out of which Rhys’s difficult character grows, presenting a logical train of events that makes her later actions and her bitterness the more inevitable.

Even before the author is a teenager, disappointment and happiness roll around in her like the proverbial cannon - her mother doesn’t love her, the island spirits terrify her, there is her father whom she idealises, but he is quickly followed by her wilful tantrums. There is early alienation, something that was to become a theme of her life. Dominican society was strict and her family was not quite respectable. And of course there were the obvious black and white issues too. And then there were men – abuse at the hands of a 70-year old and her early but complex forays into the power struggle between man and woman – as she saw it at least.

Rhys – actually born Ella Gwendoline Rhys Williams – was to become a classic outsider. It was true of almost every aspect of her life, but particularly because of her Caribbean heritage in a place that she couldn’t be a part of - one that she eventually hated – England.

Lilian Pizzichini has set herself the task of presenting ‘…the facts of Rhys’s life in such a way that the reader is left with an impression of what it was like to have lived such a life.’ And she does it well, and evocatively, though often imaginatively (because she simply cannot have known Rhys’s thoughts for sure). She has done considerable research into Rhys’s opinions though, and she then puts these into Rhys’s head, using indirect free speech, so that we see them from the inside. Additionally, much of Rhys’s writing, if not auto-biographical, was taken from life, so Pizzichini is able to use a number of the passages from her novels to describe Rhys’s actual life.

And there’s no doubt that Rhys led an extraordinary life. She went to England to complete her education and found that she hated it. She took to the fringes of Edwardian life – she couldn’t bear to commit to the core of its respectability – and became a chorus girl and dancer. This she was fascinated by and observed acutely, but of course she could not belong. She took lovers and was a prostitute in a manner of speaking. She married a Belgian crook and occasional spy and moved to Paris and Vienna. She knew some of the leading literary figures of the day. She became the lover of Ford Madox Ford (inevitably in a complicated ménage à trois with his long time lover Stella Bowen). Rhys lived life on the edge in so many ways.

Rhys had disappointments that would deeply have affected a normal person too - her baby boy died of pneumonia aged three weeks, and there were rejections by lovers – but they only served to increase her alienation and dissatisfaction. There was short-lived critical recognition around the Second World War - the critics acknowledged her talent as a writer, though her world view was simply too depressing for the time. Eventually she descended into drunkenness and sometimes violence, given to disputes with her neighbours and anti-English rants.

As the reader you really get to a sense of how complex and self-destructive she was when you come to sentences like this - ‘…she savoured the sweet bitterness of having been abandoned by so many loved ones.’ And ‘She always behaved badly when someone was nice to her because she had to pre-empt their inevitable abandonment of her.’

For all of this Rhys was also a charismatic and attractive figure. And lucky, too. She found many people who were resolutely kind to her and loyal. Of course she was innovative in her writing as well, though inevitably success was too long in coming.

So, did Dominica contribute to her character? She wrote about the island, and about colonial life. It was her one proper home, she said, though of course when she returned in 1936 she hated it. She fell out with the people there and saw her childhood dreams smashed to boot. But in a different way it pervaded the last years of her life – through her masterpiece, Wide Sargasso Sea and in a strange way, the story of this book strikes a subliminally positive note in a substantial part of Pizzichini’s narrative. It represents a well of latent success that simply has to spring forth and force aside the author’s unease with herself. The book stayed with Rhys for twenty or thirty years, bubbling under in her in tandem with her madness. It survived the burning of an early draft, but finally it came out in 1966 and she received the acclaim that was hers.

Generally The Blue Hour is a successful evocation of the woman. The impressions we get of being Jean Rhys are largely convincing and it is a compelling enough story to want to keep reading. Like Rhys’s novels it is frustrating, but that is less to do with the biographer than the material. It’s just hard to believe that someone, even the most sensitive of writers, could be so perverse and destructive to those around her -

‘… the person who was most against her was herself’.

The Blue Hour by Lilian Pizzichini is published by Bloomsbury. For more information, see www.Bloomsbury.com. For more information about Dominica, see the Definitive Caribbean Guide to Dominica.

Karst in the Caribbean - Cockpit Country

2009-06-22T17:34:00.004+01:00

Karst is one of the Caribbean’s oddest geological features, a pattern of limestone that appears in several of the Greater Antilles and which has become a sight in its own right.

The rock (which takes its name from the Krs area of the former Yugoslavia) has been uplifted by tectonic movement and exposed to erosion. Any split in the rock has been exploited by the tropical rains, which have rushed through, carving and cutting holes, hollowing out caves and gradually dissolving the rock (limestone is soluble in acid). In places it has eroded in fairly regular patterns, leaving an extremely weird landscape. In Jamaica’s case, the Cockpit Country is like a massive, shaggy green eggbox that stretches for miles and miles.

The most famous sections of karst are the Viñales area of western Cuba, where the vertical walled outcrops marooned in the fertile plains are known as mogotes, and in the Dominican Republic, where there is a whole range of furry green lumps appear in the Los Haitises National Park in the north of the country. From above, the park looks like a very difficult green jigsaw. Similarly, in Puerto Rico there is a range eroded into the limestone plateau in the north of the island.

But the Cockpit Country is the most extensive of all. A flight from Montego Bay to Kingston flies above it, a sudden belt of uninterrupted and uninhabited green in an otherwise extremely populous country. In places the formations are as regular as an egg carton. It’s just that the indentations are 300 feet high and there are hundreds and hundreds of them.

The name Cockpit comes from a different assessment of their shape – the slopes of the peaks are steeply angled, creating pits between them which are just the shape of the auditorium for fighting cocks (a sport which doesn’t really exist in Jamaica any more, though it can still just be seen in some of the other islands).

Interestingly the Cockpit Country has other names too. The area was used by the Maroons (early runaways) when they were holding out against the British colonialists in the early 1700s. It was easy ambush country. In fact so dangerous that it was known as ‘the Land of the Look-Behind’- soldiers reputedly rode sitting back to back on horseback in order to defend themselves – and simply, chillingly ‘You no send, me no come’.

To get an idea of what the Cockpit Country looked like on a terrain map of Jamaica, see

18.316396, -77.700462

on a google map.

Coconut milk - How to husk a coconut

2009-06-15T13:42:00.006+01:00

It was the second time in a couple of days – and the second time in five entries on this blog as it happens – that I was greeted by a man brandishing a machete. There was nothing wrong with this...

The machete is one of the twin tools of the Caribbean, along with the umbrella. Every farmer needs one, to cut back the rampant growth. It’s just that it’s still a little unexpected when you’re in the street.

In this case it was needed to despatch a coconut. The man was standing next to an ice-cream trolley full of them.

‘Chop me a nut, sir!’ I said. ‘Not too young.’

And he delved into the trolley and pulled out a good looking yellow coconut.

It was at this point he whipped out his machete. He bounced the coconut in one hand, turning it until he got just the right angle. And then THWACK! He sliced off the top of the shell. It took him four or five strokes to slice it down to the right point and then he chopped slightly more gently, shaving chips off and preventing the coconut water splashing out when he broke through. He left a hole into the inside of the nut about an inch across, rimmed the white flesh of the coconut. At this point he handed it over.

It’s a messy procedure, drinking from a coconut. Not as messy as eating a mango (for which you are probably best to get into a bath, frankly, or the sea), but it is complicated. You have to squash the shell against your nose in order to get your mouth into position - and anyway the liquid always seems to find its way down your shirt. No worry, though. Coconut water is refreshing and satisfying in the heat and a nut can contain about half a pint so there is plenty there.

But there’s more to a coconut. I handed it back – it’s part of the service - and the salesman took out his machete again...

Jamaican Jerk - Take 2

2009-06-12T15:25:00.006+01:00

You may remember my trip down memory lane about a month ago where I mused on the delights of Jamaican Jerk centres. Well, the marinade thickens. An email just landed on the desk from the Jamaica Tourist Authority with a press release introducing their ‘Jerk Trail - Jamaica's newest and spiciest!’ It talk about a culinary trail that you can follow as you make your way around the Island, with stop-offs at the places that offer the finest jerk.

The trail currently features eleven Jerk Centres, but I expect the list will expand … certainly Scotchie's in Montego Bay needs to be included! I’ve whiled away many an hour in there, soothing a sore tongue and gums (enflamed by hot pepper sauce) with a Red Stripe… Anyway, see below for some further details…

Supreme Jerk Centre, Green Island, Hanover
Located on the north-western tip of the island, Hanover is well known for agriculture, and sees the production of yams, sugar cane and breadfruit as well as ginger and pimento, some of the spices needed for the jerk marinade. Also it is celebrated for breeds of cattle, pigs and goats.

Border Jerk Centre, Ramble, Hanover

Ultimate Jerk Centre, Discovery Bay
Located on Jamaica's north coast, the huge Discovery Bay was originally named Puerto Seco (Dry Harbour) by Christopher Columbus. It is the site of the Discovery Bay Marine Laboratory, operated by the University of the West Indies, which was founded in 1965. The lab has hosted researchers from around the world focusing on coral reef biology and tropical coastal processes.

Scotchie's, Greenwich Park, Ocho Rios
Ocho Ríos (also known by the nickname Ochie), Spanish for Eight Rivers, is a town on the northern coast. It is a popular tourist destination, well known for scuba diving and other watersports.

Ocho Rios Jerk Centre

Lyming at Walkerswood, St. Ann's
Walkerswood is a small community in Ocho Rios, St Ann's which produces the popular Walkerswood Jerk Sauce. Today if you travel beyond Fern Gully, you'll see this small community. The efforts of this village can be found island-wide.

G&B Jerk Centre, Victoria Road, Kingston
Set on the southern shore, Kingston is the capital of Jamaica. It is visited primarily by business travellers, but it is the cultural heart of the island too. Take the time to visit the city … and its jerk centres.

Pon Di Corner Jerk Centre, Black Hill District, Port Antonio
As you would expect in Portland, the original home of the maroons, capital Port Antonio has several jerk centres. It lies on the north-eastern coast of Jamaica, about 60 miles (100 km) from the Capital, Kingston.

Blueberry Hill Jerk Centre, Port Antonio

Unique Jerk Centre, Hope Bay, Port Antonio

Boston Jerk, Boston Bay, Portland (finally!)
Boston Bay is known now as the home of Jerk. Located on Jamaica's north-eastern coast, it is rural and well known for its pretty beaches. The road is lined with Jerk Centres and you will see the meats being grilled in pits in the ground. Jerked foods are made with Jamaican jerk spices.

For some help with your trip through the jerk centres of Jamaica, get in touch with Rachel at Glamour Tours. If you fancy a read of my last trip to one in Boston Bay…check out Boston Bay is full of Jerks, Maroons and Buccaneers.

Kick ‘em Jenny - an active volcano in the Grenadines

2009-06-08T15:18:00.006+01:00

Would you like to be called Kick ‘em Jenny ? It doesn’t sound exactly like a compliment... But this is no bronco, or any angry young woman for that matter. Kick ‘em Jenny is a stretch of rough water to the north of Grenada, in the Grenadines.

The reason for the name is that Kick ‘em Jenny is a submarine volcano. It rises over 4000 from the sea bed and comes to within about 600 feet of the surface of the sea. And the reason for the rough water is that the Atlantic currents stack up against this natural barrier, creating into an unpleasant swell on the surface. The name is reckoned to derive from the French /‘Caye qui me gêne’/, which means ‘island that disturbs me’, but frankly Kick ‘em Jenny is equally expressive. Certainly it can
feel like that it in a boat. In fact yacht companies ask you not to go there.

Like so many of the Caribbean volcanoes, Kick ‘em Jenny is relatively active and it often features on the seismic data collected in the area. But people notice it too. Pilots report seeing activity when flying over the area – bubbles and submarine clouds of debris. Grumbling noises are also occasionally heard on land nearby.

The most recent major eruption was in 1939, when ash and steam broke the surface of the sea, spewing and steaming and setting off tsunamis in the area. Since then there have been a dozen significant eruptions, most recently in 2001. According to the vulcanologists, in the years to come another Grenadine may eventually appear.

The Bahamas by Mailboat...

2009-06-01T15:23:00.002+01:00

Few people who visit the Bahamas ever hear of Potter’s Cay, though many pass within a few yards of it each time that they are whisked off Paradise Island in one of those ridiculous white stretch limos that are so popular in Nassau. Where Paradise Island is fabricated Caribbean perfection -- massive casino, glitz and high-rise hotels -- Potter’s Cay is its alter-ego, a shabby looking area of working docks beneath the bridge.

Potter’s Quay is the main mail-boat dock that links the central Bahamian island of New Providence, where the capital Nassau is situated, to all the Out Islands, the literally hundreds of islands, ribbons of rock and sandbars spread over 100,000 square miles of the spectacularly blue Bahamian sea. After Nassau it is a reminder that real West Indian life does exist in the Bahamas after all.

The mailboats are the Out Islanders’ lifeline. Pretty much every tea-bag, breeze-block, can of condensed milk and car that reaches them is transported this way. And that’s not to forget the mail of course, some of which also travels by sea. They also take passengers if requested, which makes a novel way of travelling around the islands. As many of them travel overnight, you even get a cheap (well, comparatively, it is the Bahamas) bunk for the night.

With a departure scheduled for 5pm I was a little panicked when Bahamas Air thrummed into Nassau Airport two hours late, at five minutes to five. But this is the Bahamas. When I finally pitched up, Bahamas Daybreak III, 120 foot long, destination Governor’s Harbour and Rock Sound in Eleuthera, was still surrounded by piles of cargo.

There was all the chaos of the dock: shouts of instruction, jokes and high five greetings and in the background a small stereo screaming tinny dancehall rap -- Murderer! A fork lift truck beetled back and forth lifting pallets on board, which were then shunted or hefted by men: bread in crates, breezeblocks, bags of cement, tile grout and kitty litter, tinned fruits from Trinidad, sacks of iodised salt, industrial boxes of M&Ms, slabs of Sprite. There were pot plants, films for the cinema (Black Hawk Down, Snow Dogs), private packages for Eric Cooper and Mr Hesley Johnson, and bags of onions, asparagus tips and boxes of wine for the hotels. The mailboats have been known to take coffins and even a horse or two, but tonight’s most exotic charge, swinging beneath the bow-crane, was a Bahamas Police Jeep – its motto Courage, Integrity, Loyalty stamped on its door.

Loading was clearly going to continue for some time yet. I headed off to grab some food, passing boats headed for Exuma, Bimini (Hemingway’s hangout in Islands in the Stream) and the delightfully named Ragged Island. Under the stanchions of Paradise Island bridge are a line of stalls selling fried fish and the local speciality cracked conch. Conch comes out of its shell, a bit like a dalek, as a rubbery handkerchief with a claw. It is tough so it is battered (with a hammer) and then battered again (with batter) before being deep fried and served with hot pepper sauce.

Eventually Bahamas Daybreak III left, in darkness, just a couple of hours late. We glided past the sailing yachts, fishing boats and the gin palaces into the open sea, leaving the Paradise Island high-rises behind. A full moon lit the calm sea up for miles around.

The captain allowed me up into the wheelhouse, where there was a bank of machines, radar, gps, depth sounders, automatic pilot. When I asked about the weather he paused and looked at the sky. I was poised for a nugget of sailor’s wisdom, for a moment:

‘Ah doan know. Mi didn’ look at de forecast.’

It looked pretty flat anyway.

He described the route, following a string of romantic sounding ‘cays’: Rose Island, Booby Rocks, Samphire, Six Shilling… The whole trip crossed the Great Bahama Bank, where the sea is never more than about 30 feet deep. It is also drug and desperation territory. One mailboat captain, cruising along on a pitch black night, actually sliced a boat of Haitian refugees in half. In their bid to reach America undetected they were travelling overloaded, without lights.

We docked before first light and the unloading began. The dock at Governor’s Harbour was soon littered with piles of goods. At dawn the shop-owners, hotel managers and private individuals expecting packages appeared, loaded their pick-ups and sped off. The bread truck arrived. Mr Hesley Johnson’s boxes sat for a while and then were gone. One man cussed the captain for bringing the wrong cargo and another searched the boat for a door-frame that simply wasn’t there. By nine the dock was nearly clear and Bahamas Daybreak III was on its way to Rock Sound in the south of the island.

ravenala madagascariensis - The Traveller's Tree

2009-05-26T10:13:00.005+01:00

One of the most distinctive plants you will see around the Caribbean is the Traveller’s Tree, which stands in a splay of massive leaves up to fifteen feet long. They point vertically, rolled like a parchment to begin with, but they soon unfurl and gradually point off the vertical, like the hands of a clock, as each new leaf takes the previous one’s place. The most particular characteristic of the traveller’s tree, though, is that the leaves grow in a single plane, giving it the appearance of a huge fan.

Sometimes it is called the Traveller’s Palm, but this is in fact incorrect as it is not a palm at all. The source of the confusion is clear as it grows in a similar way, but it is actually more closely related to the banana. The leaves are distinctly bananery to look at and when the tree fruits it drops a proboscis with an extraordinary fruit like a series of lobster claws (very similar to the lobster claw heliconia). Its botanical name, ravenala madagascariensis, gives a clear indication where it originates, but it is now all over the tropical world.

So, why the name? It has often been said that the fan stands aligned east–west, thereby helping travellers to know their direction. This, it turns out, is not true, as they grow aligned in other directions as well. However, they are useful to travellers as they are a reliable source of water. At the base of the fan, between the stems of the leaves, is a sort of cup in which water collects as it runs down the stem. Stick a straw in there, or more likely drill a small hole, and you can find water.

Boston Bay is full of Jerks, Maroons and Buccaneers

2009-05-18T15:35:00.004+01:00

It was an unexpected reaction. As I handed a ticket through a grille, the man behind the bars reached for a machete… But then, with his other hand he grabbed a half chicken - recently barbecued, slightly charred and glistening. It looked delicious. He slapped it onto the block and proceeded to hack it into pieces. Then he lobbed the hacked chicken into a large piece of paper.

‘Pepper sauce?’ he asked.

Not likely, I thought. ‘No thanks,’ I said.

I know about pepper sauce. It infects everything organic for yards around, with a scalding overlay that sears your taste buds into non-sensibility. Actually it’s worse. It’s painful. To be honest there is enough chilli for me in the jerk mix already.

While eating, sitting at a plastic deck chair, I turned to musing on the name jerk. I have often wondered whether it is related somehow to beef jerky, the flavoured, dried meat so beloved of South Africans and once of cowboys.

The leading theory is that both names come from a process called charqui. Apparently the South American Indian Quechua tribe would salt meat and then dry it in the sun or over low fires. Actually there have been processes like this all over the world. The Caribbean buccaneers - seventeenth century hunters in Haiti - did a similar thing to wild pig meat and to beef cattle. Their name, which was taken from their boucans, or grills, was eventually given to bacon. The buccaneers would sell the dried meat to ships.

Jerking in Jamaica had a slightly different version, even though it took the name. The Maroons, escaped slaves who hid out in remote mountains, needed a method of cooking which would not give up a smell or leave a visible smoke trail in the sky. Their solution was to cook their meat – again wild pig, largely – slowly, in underground ovens. The salting became a marinade and nowadays it is cooked in barbecues in the ground.

There are jerk centres all over Jamaica now, though the home of jerk is in the east, beneath the John Crow Mountains, where one group of Maroons used to live. Hence the many Jerk Centres lining the roadside in Boston Bay in Portland.

Of course it’s hard not to muse on the name as well as the origins. A Jerk Centre?! You wonder what people would do in there. Body-pop and break dance badly? Take over-acting to a new level? And not only do you get Jerk Centres, but I once passed an ‘Executive Jerk Centre’. Blimey. Perhaps they dress up in suits, chat over-earnestly and take to heart all the advice from about the latest business self-improvement books.

Papiaments - Chatter in Curaçao, Babble in Bonaire, Anything in Aruba?

2009-05-11T13:53:00.010+01:00

Of all the creoles you hear in the Caribbean the oddest is surely the one which comes from the ABC islands - the cluster of three Netherlands Antilles off the coast of Venezuela - Papiamento, as it is known in Aruba (in Curaçao it is called Papiamentu and in Bonaire, Papiamen.

As the great traders of the Caribbean, the Dutch were most concerned most with ports. And in Curaçao, a generally low-lying and barren island, they found a truly magnificent harbour (Bonaire and Aruba they took to protect the approaches from seaborne invasion). Willemstad worked very successfully as a port for centuries, and it gathered, as you would expect, an immense number of different types of people - Europeans, Latin Americans and Africans, even a few Indonesians from the Dutch East Indies. The different strains baked into an extraordinary creole mix. There is even a (culinary) dish that mixes oriental rice and Edam cheese. Very odd.

And you can imagine what happened with the language. A hundred different strains intermingled, to create sounds that are more than the sum of their parts. As an anglo outsider, you think momentarily that it might be Spanish, but then you hear unaccustomed and wayward sounds, as though the words have got out of control. There is the background staccato of Spanish – a taca-taca-taca – with an occasional interloping, possibly Portuguese vowel – a taca-taca-taca-wow – and then the oddest Dutch interjection – a taca-taca-taca-wow-taca-plömpf!

Interestingly, the word Papiament, which - logically at least - means ‘chatter’ or ‘spoken language’, can have the sense of both ‘Parliament’ and ‘babble’. A reassuring thought for all voters...

The Pitons By Chopper - A St Lucia Fly By

2009-05-05T12:37:00.010+01:00

Helicopter travel is not that regular in the Caribbean, but it does happen. Choppers are used for sightseeing sometimes and of course they are useful for getting to remote places quickly, high into the mountains, for instance.

My only helicopter trip in the Caribbean was courtesy of LeSport in St Lucia, when as part of a BBC team I was flown from the international airport in the south to the north of the island, the location of the hotel. It saved a long journey by road and of course it is fun to do. And there was one exceptional moment during the trip. I expect the pilots love doing it, but as a passenger it was stomach-lurching as it was impressive and unforgettable.

Helicopters are always fun to travel in. We were sent forward by the hostess to the machine which was idling on the tarmac, dipping our heads as we came under the rotors. I blagged my way to the front seat next to the pilot and grabbed the headphones. The pilot talked briefly to the control tower and then tensed as he deliberately pressed the footplate and held onto his gear stick. The rotors ground into the air, the cage of the airframe shuddering, whining and screaming a hundred different mechanical complaints.

We lifted gradually and at thirty feet the pilot put the nose down and drove us forwards. His eyes were on the horizon, but I watched the ground pass away beneath us - tarmac, grass, perimeter fence, cattle, a rivulet, individual trees dotted in a plain, a village of red roofs along a serpentine valley, a car making its way along a half hidden road five hundred feet below us. And then the interminable green, with barely a visible human imprint, just an occasional plot cut into the steep hillsides. Otherwise it was simply the canopy, like a green blanket covering the steep valleys and clefts that ran across our path.

We climbed, steadily, keeping pace with the rising ground - six, eight hundred feet, a thousand, twelve hundred. The Gros Piton rose on our left, a massive lump. I can’t remember at what point the tip of the Petit Piton appeared, but gradually it imposed itself on the surroundings, a spike of stone soaring out of the greenery. We chugged on and gradually up, maintaining a position a couple of hundred feet above the canopy, the green sea of the forest.

I guessed what was coming, but there is nothing to prepare you for the gut-wrenching, utterly boggling moment when it happens. Suddenly we cleared the lip of the land. It was like a fairground ride. The carpet of green beneath us fell away five hundred feet in an instant and suddenly we were a tiny blob in a massive volcanic bowl, all of which was clearly visible in the glass bubble of the helicopter. A miniature tennis court, red roofs dotted in the greenery, tiny fluorescent windsurf sails on the beach far below.

To make it worse, the pilot began to descend at once – a touch more quickly that he needed to, perhaps - and my stomach was left a hundred feet above me. The blackened wall of the Petit Piton is so vast that it seemed just feet ahead and I wanted to shout at him to watch out – surely we were about to pile into it – even though intellectually I knew it was half a mile away.

But it was all in a day’s work for him. He calmly swung the airframe around to the left, swooping, down a thousand feet over the Jalousie Hilton (as it was then) and out to sea, swinging back into land and coming in to rest on their landing pad on the water’s edge. The other passenger got out and we continued our journey. We climbed and climbed and headed north along the coast, passing over the bays, beaches and towns. The Caribbean coast of St Lucia is exceptional in itself, but nothing can compare to a close up of the Petit Piton from a chopper.

Unwelcome Protrusion - Mont Pelé Erupts on Ascension Day, 1902

2009-04-27T10:36:00.007+01:00

The Caribbean is quite well known for its volcanoes, which stand in a line between St Kitts and Grenada, where the Caribbean tectonic plate is gradually forcing its way under the Atlantic plate. They are very active, relatively. And a few people will have heard of the catastrophic eruption of Mt Pelé on Ascension Day morning in May 1902, which killed 30,000 people within a couple of minutes and completely destroyed the town of St Pierre, then the cultural capital of Martinique and the French West Indies.

But what about this for a curious natural phenomenon? In the September following the eruption, as the mountain continued to erupt, a column of solidified lava began to protrude from the top of Mont Pelé. The 'Tower of Pelé, a volcanic plug between 300 and 500 feet across, was so hot that it glowed. Over the next month it pushed its way up out of the crater until it reached a height of nearly 1000 feet. On one day it managed to grow 78 feet, but with each new volcanic eruption, the material split and cracked and eventually in 1929 it collapsed.

On the Bus - Caribbean Style! Part 2

2009-04-20T12:35:00.012+01:00

You see names on buses all over the Caribbean. Some islands go in for it more than others, but they offer a good insight into Caribbean life.

In fact in Haiti they go far further than just naming their buses, They dress them up like circus lorries. But there is usually a religious slogan written on the front and side in Kweyol (Haitain Creole). Hey, it’s comforting to know, as you walk carelessly across a road that was empty a nano-second before, and look up to discover you are about to be run over by a super-charged gypsy caravan, that the last thing you read will be a blessing -

Béni Soit l’Eternel (Blessed is the Eternal Lord).

On one bus I saw the word Nissan written right underneath. Translated it would mean -

Blessed is the Eternal Nissan - not such a comforting thought to die with, unless you’re a Japanese salaryman possibly.

In most islands buses have a simple name, sometimes the driver’s nickname (most West Indians have them). In St Vincent recently you had the pleasure of nearly being run over by – or to be fair, getting a ride in -

Captain Sess, Rasta Ride, Freddy or Zion.

Or it might be Diplomat. Who knows how that got its name - a foreign ministry official turned taximan? His other car is a Diplomat? And Squeala? Does that come from the agonised screeching of his tyres, as he takes off to his next destination. Or was he involved in a B-movie and spilled the beans under torture. And what about the delightfully named Random?

Other names speak of the drivers’ (sometimes inestimable) self esteem - not to forget their driving prowess, no doubt -

No Fear! Shy Guy (yeah, likely), Xtreme and Rush.

And others are just plain surreal, but have a certain catchiness – no doubt they are the coolest bus in town –and therefore the one you definitely want to ride. What would it mean to ride in -

Code Red?

But my favourite name for a bus was always Not Guilty, Your Honour!, a bus that would ply its trade – or is that roar off in a cloud of grey exhaust? - along the west coast main road in Barbados. Perhaps it was a form of rebellion. You can just imagine the driver, in trouble again, standing in the dock,

"Are you, Mr John Smith, the driver of bus named Not Guilty, Your Honour? And did you drive Not Guilty, Your Honour at speeds without the specifications of the law? And have you anything to say in your defence…?"

The whole court would be in hysterics!

A Confusion of Nautical Names - Guadeloupe Explained

2009-04-15T12:53:00.003+01:00

If leeward and windward always seem unnecessarily complicated to landlubbers, then pity the poor visitor to Guadeloupe.

The two ‘wings’ of the ‘butterfly’ of Guadeloupe are called Basse-Terre and Grande-Terre. Logic would tell you that ‘Basse’-Terre, meaning ‘low’ ground, would be the lower one and Grande-Terre (‘big ground’) the larger. Not so! Basse-Terre is a hulking volcanic colossus that soars to nearly 5000 feet, while Grande-Terre is physically not really that impressive at all. Mysteriously Grande-Terre is actually smaller in surface area than Basse-Terre too, so it is hard to see the justification for the name.

As it turns out Basse-Terre is the French equivalent of windward because it is the ‘lower ground’ with regard to the wind. Leeward is generally ‘capesterre’, so why Grande-Terre is called so is another mystery - until it becomes apparent that it is ‘grande’ by comparison to the two tiny Petit-Terre islands just offshore.

But in all of this linguistic confusion there is one shining light of oddity. One of Guadeloupe’s offshore islands is called la Désirade. Why? Because it was the first land that sailors would see on the old Atlantic crossing. After anything up to three months at sea they would be scouring the horizon, longing for any sight of land. La Désirade was literally ‘the desired one’.

Carousel tails - Waiting for luggage at Fort de France in Martinique

2009-04-06T14:48:00.006+01:00

With all the short inter-island flights, Caribbean travellers spend quite a bit of time hanging around in airports. Once, these were tiny wooden sheds, with overhead fans spinning...‘squeak, clunk, squeak, clunk’ - or just sweltering silence - but now all but the smallest airports have an air-conditioned departure lounge.

This time, in the early Nineties it was, I found myself in the old inter-island terminal at Fort de France in Martinique. Actually I was not waiting to board a flight, rather waiting for my luggage, which seemed to be taking an age to reach the baggage hall. I was the only person who had got off the LIAT flight in Fort de France, so I imagined it abandoned on the tarmac somewhere, just lost in the system. My imagination began to run away with me. Perhaps, this being France, the baggage handlers were on strike (it’s one of the habits that the French West Indians have happily picked up from their metropolitan counterparts). I approached a person in a window and asked gingerly what was going on.

‘Trente minutes!’ (Thirty minutes) Thunk. The window closed, as though that was explanation enough.

There are times when you huff and puff in frustration at this sort of thing, and demand to see the manager, but good things happen to those who wait around in the Caribbean. So I found a plastic chair and sat down to wait. It was a fairly typical Caribbean scene. The two short carousels were surrounded by piles and piles of luggage, stacks of the things that you see so regularly in the islands, the odd car tyre, massive cardboard boxes tied up with twine and addressed to people with wonderfully exotic names like Hypolite Louis d’Or. And then those woven sacks of red, white and blue plastic, with spiky pineapple crowns sticking out of them.

As I looked around I realised there must be something going on, with all this luggage stacking up. But there was silence, extreme inactivity. It could have been a surreal French movie. The minutes ticked by. No other flights arrived, so I sat alone. An occasional security man or porter came in, scratched his head in confusion, and left. I sat, having generally dreamy thoughts, punctured briefly by volcanic bad-temper that then subsided soon enough.

Then a man arrived, in tropical French uniform, long socks, pressed shorts, powder blue shirt and the paraphernalia of officialdom, gold epaulettes, pistol, possibly even a képi cap (the memory is too distant now). At his side was a sniffer dog, a delicate, bright-looking thing about the size of a spaniel. Perhaps I had been unfair to the baggage handlers. Perhaps they weren’t on strike. Perhaps this was a hunt for something particular.

The two of them began their rounds, lead paying in and out as they negotiated the piles of bags. The dog trotted happily from one pile to the next, sniffing carefully around the suitcases, occasionally hopping daintily onto the carousel to test the air. The tension was building. Sniffer dogs are trained to sit when they smell something. Perhaps there was a massive stash in the pile of luggage. I waited for it to go quiet and settle back on its haunches.

But suddenly the dog changed. It became uppity, a little too keen on a certain pile. The stash must be massive, I thought, to generate this sort of excitement. He buried his nose under a couple of awkwardly stacked bags, then pulled back and hopped onto the suitcase above, lunging too keenly and slipping as he made his way forward. The tension was unbearable. A whole suitcase of Colombia’s finest must be right there, in that pile. The dog was straining at his lead now and his minder was having to hold him back.

Suddenly, there was a cat. It leapt vertically out of the pile of luggage, within an ace of the straining dog’s jaws, danced over the uneven bags and sprinted, at about ninety miles per hour, along the rubber of the carousel. The dog was onto it like a shot, paws scrabbling at the suitcases, straining at the lead, throttling itself in its effort to get away. But the cat dived through the plastic flaps at the end of the carousel and was gone.

Rivers of Time – Why is everyone talking to Philippa? (Matador) Caribbean Book Review by James Henderson

2009-04-02T12:06:00.009+01:00

Rivers of Time is about captivation by the Caribbean. It is set largely on Nevis, which is ideal for a romantic dream of this sort to begin with. More than on other islands it is possible to see the history there – the plantation buildings poking through the overgrowth and the incredibly pretty stone bridges marooned by the straightened road. Pause for a moment and in these ruins you can feel the effort, care, even love that went into building the island. It is this connection with the West Indies, the people who carved their life in a frontier land, that is the most romantic tale of all.

As you might expect from the title, Rivers of Time momentarily draws together the streams of several lives. One is that of the author herself, Dr June Goodfield, who visits the island on holiday (and stays at Montpelier Plantation Inn, itself an old plantation restored). She is shown a memorial stone lost in the bush. There is not much more than three names – Philippa Prentis Phillips and those of her two husbands - and the year of her death. But it is the start of a compulsion and the courses of the two lives combine. Who was this other woman? What was her life like? How did it start and end? Captivation complete.

The discovery is a process that takes 20 years in all. Dr Goodfield describes the many people she meets and how she trawls libraries and archives, gathering any, even the tiniest, nugget of information that can contribute to her story. At one stage we hear that among the 12,000 emigrants recorded in one archive just two were called Philippa – what luck that there were only two, but at one every 6000, what an effort to find them.

The book divides into three sections, the first and last of which are a frame on which the story is woven. They are written in the first person by Dr Goodfield and tell the story of the discovery, her motivation and her eventual resolution of the search. But the other, the middle section, is very different. Here the author departs from the factual and personal and, using her considerable knowledge of Nevis and undoubted expertise as a historian, tells the story in a different way, as a historical novel.

She follows the story of Philippa Stephens from her village in Ashburton in Devon in the early 1600s, through the plague which decimated her village, to emigration in The Margarett in 1634 and her arrival in Nevis. Then she tells of her life, as Philippa and her husband carve out their plantation on Saddle Hill, planting first tobacco and indigo and later sugar. Their lives mirror the success and development of Nevis itself, which was so fertile and productive that it was known as ‘the Queen of the Caribbees’.

As Goodfield herself acknowledges, to fictionalise a story in this way is a controversial method among historians, but she feels that it is the best way for her to bring back the memories of these other, now forgotten lives. Of course there is simply no way of being sure that it is true (and life for Philippa is quite likely to have been blacker and more desperate than she describes) - but by presenting it in this way she makes it more compelling to read. The drier aspects of the history, all that peering in documents, which sustains the frame of the story is reduced, so that it does not become overwhelming. There is a good deal of imaginary dialogue, which though clearly modern, is otherwise convincing and brings the lives and concerns of Philippa Prentis and her family alive.

Rivers of Time is an easy and pleasant read. It is also revealing. While the narrative is necessarily uncertain, the setting on the other hand is solid. You can feel the work of the historian in the background, drawing on extensive research and understanding to paint life in the early days of Nevis, when the small colony struggled for survival but gradually grew into a successful settlement.

The author also has an obvious love for Nevis, which will make a regular visitor smile. There is a touching sense of gentle Nevisian charm and politeness. And, in typical West Indian fashion, as soon as word gets about of Goodfield’s quest, everyone pitches in to help.

And Rivers of Time was certainly enough to captivate my wife. She began to read it over my shoulder and then nipped off with the book when I put it down.

Rivers of Time – Why is everyone talking to Philippa? By June Goodfield, published by Matador, www.riversoftime.com.

APRIL FOOL!

2009-03-31T23:57:00.004+01:00

As you will have worked out, the lovely island of St Jacques does not exist. It was a literary fantasy brought to life by Patrick Leigh Fermor. Follow the link to order his novel - The Violins of Saint-Jacques: A Tale of the Antilles.

We hope you enjoyed our little amusement?!

If you have come here directly or from a search engine then you might want to read the following article to make sense of our April Fool... The Violins of Saint Jacques.

We might also point out that we realise certain countries have certain traditions about playing the fool before midday or else you become the fool...Hopefully, as our site is a global one, we will be forgiven for running this story throughout the day?!

The Barbados Sea Turtle Project

2009-03-30T15:31:00.006+01:00

To witness a turtle laying its eggs is one of the Caribbean’s great natural spectacles. The mother drags herself up onto the sand, propelling herself laboriously around the beach, leaving a trail like a tank-track. She half digs a decoy nest and then selects a laying spot where she digs her hole, flinging the sand away with her rear fins. And then, as laying begins, she goes into a trance. In years past this made her, and her eggs, uniquely vulnerable to human predation. Species of turtles are reckoned to have lived on the earth for around 250 million years. Now they are on the endangered list.

And if nesting is so fantastic, hatching is another wonderful sight. The tiny turtles struggle up out of the nest and flip their way to the sea, guided by the slight differential of light on the sea horizon. They have an immense challenge ahead. About a one in thousand will make it into adulthood. And the human threat is there again. There are even slightly macabre stories of baby turtles marching straight off to a bar, because they are confused by the lights inland.

Of course there are efforts to help them. Turtle products have long been banned in the United States and there is a growing consciousness in the Caribbean itself. In some communities they have become part of the tourist fabric - bringing visitors to watch can bring in cash, which gives the community a reason to protect the turtles.

Key to the efforts to help turtles are organisations such as the BSTP in Barbados, the Barbados Sea Turtle Project. It has monitored the critically endangered marine turtle species that forage around and nest on Barbados for the last 20 years. Based at the University of the West Indies (UWI) at Cave Hill Campus, their involvement includes monitoring and conservation of nesting females and hatchlings, research, education and public outreach.

Professor Julia Horrocks, director of the Barbados Sea Turtle Project, is the Country Coordinator for the Wider Caribbean Sea Turtle Conservation Network (WIDECAST) in Barbados, and of the regional WIDECAST Marine Turtle Tagging Centre. The BSTP gives presentations at schools, churches and other institutions to raise public awareness and support. During the nesting season (May to October), they lecture weekly at Treasure Beach Hotel on the West Coast.

The BSTP invites anyone to sign up for a hatchling release. The hawksbill turtle’s hatching season runs from mid-July through to mid-October and hatchlings usually emerge naturally between 6pm and 6am. However the BSTP will try and time their releases between 6pm and 8pm.

Activity is not restricted to the West Coast and it is not just the hawksbills that lay their eggs in Barbados. Until recently green turtles had never nested in the island and those seen along the West Coast are actually juveniles (10-15 years old), primarily from Ascension Island, Costa Rica and Surinam. They are expected to leave Barbados and swim back home to nest once they have reached maturity (25-30 years of age). However the BSTP estimate that about five females have begun nesting on the south east coast. As there are no historical records of this happening before, so it appears to be a new population that is colonizing Barbados for the first time.

It may also come as a surprise to hear that between 50-80 mighty leatherback turtles also head to Barbados each year to nest. These massive creatures are confined to the east coast as they need the help of powerful Atlantic waves to heave themselves up onto the beach. Leatherbacks are the world’s largest sea turtle and an adult male can weigh as much as 920kg and grow up to three metres in length – adult females are 1.4-1.8m long and weigh 250-650kg. The leatherback nesting season is a little earlier in the year, between March and July, and they lay between 70-90 eggs at each nesting. Once they have laid their eggs they head off to feed in British or Canadian waters where there is a plentiful supply of jelly fish. A fourth species that is occasionally spotted in Barbados waters is the loggerhead turtle. It does not nest on the island.

All of the Caribbean sea turtles mentioned above are endangered and protected species – leatherback, hawksbill and Kemps Ridley sea turtles are critically endangered.

Tradewinds? Passaatwinden? Les Alizés?

2009-03-24T11:40:00.007Z

Few aspects of Caribbean climate are more romantic than the Tradewinds. Sure, the sunset is probably the classic, preferably seen from a palm-fringed beach, and particularly on a cloudless evening when you have the chance of seeing the Green Flash as the sun disappears over the sea horizon. But as well as their balmy effect on the Caribbean weather, taking the edge off the tropical heat, the Tradewinds have a whimsical aspect that has been known to bring people out in poetry.

It’s worth considering the name itself. You might think that the English /Tradewinds/ would refer rather literally to the seaborne commerce that was so important in the 1700s. In fact the /‘Trade’/ comes from an old English word, /tread/, meaning direction. The winds were used by ship captains to get to the islands and so they were named for this.

Who knows what the Dutch might have had in mind with the strange-sounding /Passaatwinden/, but of course it is those flighty, romantic French who have the most lyrical name for this Caribbean wind. To them, the lumpy old Tradewinds are the /Les Alizés/. You can see why Apollinaire was moved to verse.

The Tradewinds have their effect on the weather of course and even on the land. They cause all the rain and the resulting greenery. They hit the coast off the Atlantic and then rise, water-laden, on the massive slopes, turning into the vast clouds that then dump huge amounts of rainfall. The rain in the Windward Islands is measured in tens of feet per year.

But the oddest effect is in the ABC islands, the Netherlands Leeward Islands, which are so windy sometimes that people walk around a bit like Charlie Chaplin, leaning sideways into the wind. And there is a tree, the /divi divi/, which has given up the ghost and accepted its fate. Instead of growing vertically, at about ten feet it turns at ninety degrees, growing parallel to the ground. Actually it looks like a woman bent downwind at the waist, her shawl and hair blowing on the wind.

On the bus - Caribbean style!

2009-03-16T17:14:00.009Z

Riding the buses in the Caribbean has always been a good exposure to local West Indian life. Of course, most West Indians avoid them like the plague, calling them hot, crowded and noisy (they’d prefer to be in an air-conditioned car, mostly), but for a traveller they are always an adventure, a source of local gossip and an intravenous plug into the current musical hits.

Expect a lively ride… You’ll see them coming, bobbing and weaving in the traffic, squeezing through any gap in which they can fit – and a few they can’t! Out on the open road they perform all the same manoeuvres at high speed, running the central line in second gear as they prepare to floor the accelerator to get another rung up the traffic – it’s another reason that West Indians avoid them if they can.

But they are also fun. Things happen to you when you are out and about in the Caribbean. In Jamaica, sitting passengers are simply given things to hold for ‘standees’ – schoolbooks, shopping, anything goes, they drop it on your lap. Once, as a man in my late thirties, I was sitting quietly, to find myself handed a baby. Both he and his mother just smiled sweetly at me while I wondered what exactly I was supposed to do.

There is a magical quality to West Indian buses. You must understand that in terms of a departure schedule, well there is none, usually. Departure times are a near-mystical calculation – a carefully weighed balance in the driver’s mind, of how many passengers are sitting in his (usually his) bus at a given moment, against how many he thinks he can pick up on the way. Oh, then the decision is filtered through his boredom threshold, and whether there is someone, usually a slim 20 year old, whom he can impress with his driving as he roars off.

But most of all, Caribbean buses are like mobile discotheques. You can sometimes hear them coming before you can see them, with a thump, thump, thump that echoes down the valley. Inside they are incredibly loud, and the chassis reverberates to the latest tunes. Sometimes you get the idea that the stereo is worth more than the bus itself.

Actually it got out of hand recently in a number of islands. In Trinidad – those contrary Trinis don’t have mini-buses by the way, they have maxi-taxis - there were stories of school-children skipping food so that they could spend their lunch money on a bus-ride. Anyway, the rude-boys were having it too good and so the moral majority came out fighting. They got the banned music in the buses in several islands.

And so it was that I stepped onto a ZR van once, which was running along the south coast of Barbados. Tinted windows, oversize wheels and the shift and tick of cymbals and a bass thrum that threatened. The driver – hair shaved into a Nike tick, gold teeth with Nike tick, dark glasses on a cloudy day - his sidekick, a conductor of sorts - communicating in a sign language, all pointing – it was all a bit intimidating, really, not to say confusing.

Driver was doing all the wrong things. He was stopping in the middle of the road to pick up and let down, honking at old folk not travelling at the mandatory speed (very fast). But then, blow me down, if he didn’t veer off the road - on two wheels, I think - and grind his way through the backstreets of Inch Marlow. Suddenly he screeched to a halt at a small house – all to let down a lady so that she didn’t have to carry her shopping all the way from the main road. Bless.

Pere Labat – Dominican Missionary, Gastronome and Occasional Spy

2009-03-09T18:03:00.005Z

Père Labat, a Dominican missionary (and engineer, botanist and explorer), spent ten years living in the Caribbean until 1705. He was based in Martinique, but he was an adventurous type and was able to travel widely in the region. He was endlessly inquisitive, always humorous and a busy-body without compare. He recorded his experiences in his /Nouveau Voyage aux Iles de l’Amerique/, which was published in 1705.

As a religious man he was of course charged with tending to people spiritually, which he did in the Atlantic parish of Macouba in Martinique, but he was just as happy to defend them militarily and at times he is seen manning cannons when a ship comes under threat. And as it happens, he was also particularly keen to tend to his stomach. His writings are peppered with stories of the sumptuous meals he enjoyed.

One minute he is found chatting, over dinner of course, with English admirals in Barbados (and quietly making sketches of the island’s defences for his compatriots) and the next he is giving Mass to Catholic pirates and buccaneers. He even devised a system of compensation for their injured - so much for an eye, a hand, a leg – a pension scheme for pirates if you like. Smuggling was rife at the time. In Barbados he noted that the ship hands worked hard unloading their cargo by day – but twice as hard at night when they were away from official eyes…

And he had a fair few adventures in his ten years. Once, on his return from Santo Domingo, his ship was taken by Spanish pirates. He refused to fire the last cannon ball in their defence. After all, he claims, it was needed to crush the garlic. A moment later he was about to be put to death, he thought, but suddenly he found himself surrounded by his captors, all on their knees... While looting his luggage they had come across a cross of Holy Inquisition… He was obviously not someone to mess with. Labat claimed that the cross was there quite by accident, but it
was enough for the pirates to set him free…

An abridged version of Labat’s work, /The Memoirs of Père Labat/, was published in English by John Eaden in 1931.

Michael Winner reviews 'The Lone Star' for the Times Online

2009-03-05T18:23:00.007Z

I'm not sure if I'm a fan of Michael Winner...he seems to court controversy wherever he goes? However, I think this review of The Lone Star, one of my favourite restaurants on the island (and, by the way, a lovely place to stay) is excellent and really quite funny! Duck pancake anyone?!

I get the feeling that even when he is rude about something he is actually only mentioning it because it deserves mention...Get what I mean? Well, if it was truly awful then he wouldn't have any positives to say, but as he mentions the places he stays at and eats at they must be worth visiting because he is actually staying and eating at them? Make sense now?

Erm, maybe not...Well - have a read of the review anyway...and get yourself to The Lone Star!

By the way, our editor James Henderson visited The Lone Star with his family one long summer ago...have a read about his time there and other Barbados restaurants with children.